Hapoel Jerusalem picked up yet another EuroCup win as they defeated U-BT Cluj-Napoca 91-79 to move their record to 9-5 on the season, good for second place just behind Valencia. DJ Seeley had the hot hand early for Cluj, but Khadeen Carrington scored with ease to give Hapoel Jerusalem a 17-9 lead after ten minutes of play. Seely continued to fill the basket as Gediminas Orelik and DeShawn Stephens both scored for the hosts to take the lead while Jeremy Morgan and Jared Harper closed the gap but Yonatan Alon’s team headed into halftime down the 37-35.

Harper and Yovel Zoosman scored while the hosts countered with the unstoppable Seeley and Zavier Simpson, but points from Morgan and Smith gave Jerusalem a 61-59 lead after thirty minutes of action. Carrington went from the inside and outside, Simpson responded, Harper added a pair of buckets and sent Smith in for a pair of dunks to close out the win.

Carrington scored 23 points, Harper added 21 points and Smith out in 13 points in the victory. Seeley scored 27 points and Simpson chipped in with 17 points in the loss.

“It’s a good win,” Jerusalem Head Coach Yonatan Alon said. “We are wounded animal and we needed this for us to know that with the players we had here we could still win. This was a big win for us. We see ourself as a defensive team and we take pride in our defense. Other than the 2nd quarter which was not good, we controlled the game and didn’t let them run and we controlled the rebound. That is how you win an away game.”

“Tough game and tough result to swallow,” Cluj Head Coach Mihai Silvan said. “This is a game we wanted to win and we didn’t play as good as we wanted to. We had problems with their physicality and you can see that in the rebounds where they had double what we had on the offensive boards. We won’t give up as there are four games left and we have our chances to move on and we will battle for the wins.”

The game MVP Jared Harper spoke about the keys to the victory, “Tough game in a tough environment, we battled and it was a game of runs but we stuck together as a team and came out with a big win.”

Maccabi Ramat Gan fell to Falco-Vulcano Szombathely 88-81 and will now need to win two straight games in the Basketball Champions League Play In series in order to advance to the Round of 16 Group Stage.

Amin Stevens, Roberto Gallinat and Kendale McCullum scored for Ramat Gan but Matt Tiby, Trey Diggs and Zlatan Perl helped the hosts to a 49-36 lead at halftime. Falco continued to control the pace of play and headed into the final frame up 70-55, but Stevens and McCullum started to score at will to cut down the lead to just 4-points with under two minutes remaining, but Tiby with a 3-point play along with free throws from Perl wrapped up the win for the Hungarian squad.

“For a few games we have put ourselves in a hole and then we have to fight back,” Ramat Gan Head Coach Shmulik Brenner explained. “It’s not a good habit to have and we have to get rid of that as soon as possible. I am proud as to how we fought but this has to be a learning experience.”

“We had to be in the game for 40 minutes and the minutes we weren’t we struggled and they came back,” Milos Konakov, Falco’s coach said. “We have to put more energy on the court defensively. We deserved this win but it’s only 1-0. We did a good job for 30 minutes and we must analyze the 10 minutes where we had issues.”

Kendale McCullum spoke about the game from his point of view, “We had a great team effort but we didn’t have the energy for the entire game. They hit 12 3-pointers and we made only 7. We had some great looks but they didn’t fall. We came back from a 20-point deficit and showed great character, if we play with the same energy as we did in the fourth things could have been different. Next week we will see them in Opava for what will be a tough game.

The game MVP Matt Tiby spoke about the game, “I thought we played well for about 35 minutes and a 5 minute drop when they got into the game, but we beat them in rebound, turnovers and steals and that is a recipe for a victory. We brought a lot of energy to the game.”