Hapoel Gilboa Galil slipped by Hapoel Jerusalem 88-85 as London Perrantes and Derek Cooke starred in the win to steal home court advantage. The Reds grabbed a 45-43 lead at halftime as Suleiman Braimoh and Retin Obasohan led the way but Perrantes and Cooke took the bull by the horns in the second half to snatch the win and shock the capital city faithful at home.

Perrantes scored 27 points and added 8 assists, Cooke recorded a double double with 17 points and 19 boards while Ronnie Harrell scored 14 points in the win. Obasohan paced the hosts with 22 points, Braimoh added 21 points and Jalen Adams scored 12 points in the loss.

“We played aggressive and didn’t have anything to lose against the top seed in a hostile environment,” game MVP London Perrantes said. “With Tyus Battke out, that gave me a bit more of an opportunity to be aggressive and shoot the ball a little bit more. I took what the defense gave me and we took the win.”

“I was surprised as to how we played,” a disappointed Jerusalem coach Yotam Halperin said. “We will learn from this and we are in the middle of a series with the next game in Gilboa. We gave up 88 points and we wanted to do some defensive things but didn’t. We gave up 19 offensive rebounds, aggressiveness and we gave up way too much to Perrantes as well. We knew that they would come to play and we have to cut down the amount of points that we gave up. We are all disappointed and the way we played just wasn’t good enough. We will need to do a lot more in order not to give up 88 points on the road.”

Bnei Herzliya stomped on Hapoel Haifa 107-85 as Maurice Kemp put on a show to help Oren Aharoni’s team to the win. Elad Hasin’s squad kept the game close midway through the third quarter, but the hosts were too much to handle as five players finished in double figures to take the win.

Kemp scored 28 points, Andy Van Vliet added 17 points and 8 rebounds while Chris Babb and Chinanu Onuaku each scored 15 points in the victory. James Ennis paced the Carmel Reds with 19 points, as Kadeem Allen and Will Rayman each scored 13 points in the loss.

“We didn’t defend well in the first half and they shot over 70%,” Herzliya coach Aharoni said. “But the story of the game was our defense in the second half. “Kemp, Shawn Dawson did a feta job and we really got a huge contribution from the bench and we needed that. We are a team that on any given day any player can step up and be the star.”

“We’re really excited about the win and we’re taking it one game at a time,” game MVP Maurice Kemp said. “We didn’t exited as we wanted to in the first half and gave it way to many easy baskets but in the sound half we corrected that. I just try to help my team any way I can. Some nights it’s scoring some defense, I just want to contribute as an older guy any way I can.”

“Exhaustion really played a part here in the second half,” Haifa coach Elad Hasin began. “The small things got us, whether it was turnovers or lack of focus. Herzliya is a good team and they punished us. We had many unforced errors but now we have to make some adjustments and come into game two a bit better.”