Hapoel defeated Maccabi 83-82 to take the Tel Aviv Derby in dramatic fashion at Yad Eliyahu sending the Reds fans into ecstasy. James Young scored a fadeaway jumper over Oz Blazyer with under a minute left in regulation time to notch the stunning victory on the yellow-and-blue’s home court.

Maccabi and Hapoel went neck and neck throughout the hard fought 40 minutes of end or end action as Jalen Reynolds and Keenan Evans paced Ioannis Sfairopoulos’s squad while Young, J’Covan Brown and JP Tokoto matched the intensity play by play for Danny Franco’s team. However, key baskets by Bar Timor as well as Brown and Idan Zalmanson beginning at the end of the third quarter with Maccabi up 12 points helped cut the lead down to 66-59 by the start of the final frame.

Timor, Brown and Zalmanson continued to score tough baskets down the stretch as Young out in the biggest one of them all to snatch the win and paint the city of Tel Aviv Red.

James Young led all scorers with 26 points, JP Tokoto added 17 points, J’Covan Brown scored 16 points and Idan Zalmanson chipped in with 12 points in the win. Jalen Reynolds paced Maccabi with 19 points, Keenan Evans added 15 points while Ante Zizic scored 12 points in the loss.

“We are on the way up after having started the season a bit on the downside,” an ecstatic Danny Franco said. “We have improved game to game and came into this matchup very focused and we knew that the arena would be packed. We hadn’t played a team the level of Maccabi yet this season and I’m happy that we knew how to stay in the game at the end of the third quarter when the game could have gotten away from us. We knew we could make a play here or there to keep us in it and I have to credit the players for that.”

“Today is a bad day for our club, players and management and I want to apologize to our fans,” Ioannis Sfairopoulos began. “Small details decided this game and we held them to 13 points in the third quarter. We wanted to keep that up in the last quarter but they scored tough shots and won the game.”

Idan Zalmanson reflected on the victory, “Our goal was to begin the game well and keep ourselves close to Maccabi. When they went up by 12 points in the third quarter we cleaned up some of the small issues and we came up big the final frame as we knew that the win would also give us a ticket to the Israel State Cup quarterfinals.”

“It’s very disappointing loss,” Jake Cohen began. “I know how much this game means to our fans and organization and we let them down and we let ourselves down. We have two choices now we can put our heads down and mope or we can work hard and improve.”

Ante Zizic and Jake Cohen scored inside to get the proceedings underway for Maccabi Tel Aviv, James Young drilled a triple for Hapoel Tel Aviv while Cohen fed Oz Blayzer for an alleyoop early on in the first quarter. JP Tokoto scored a pair of baskets for the Reds as Keenan Evans did the same at the other end but another Young 3-pointer gave Hapoel a 11-10 lead midway through the period.

Evans went from deep for Ioannis Sfairopoulos’s squad while J’Covan Brown did the same for Danny Franco’s team, Cohen and Jalen Reynolds hit midrange shots and Scottie Wilbekin added a reverse layup but Josh Owens dunked and Brown scored a layup and one as the frame ended with the hosts in front 23-21 after ten minutes of end to end action.

Owens and Young began the second quarter with points, Bar Timor put the ball off the glass and Tokoto scored yet again for Hapoel as the visitors took a 32-27 lead with 6:11 left in the half. James Nunnally dialed up long distance, Idan Zalmanson scored a driving layup, Tokoto dunked, Ante Zizic scored for the yellow-and-blue but Zalmanson swished a pair of triple to keep Hapoel up 42-34 with 2:31 remaining in the period.

Iftach Ziv nailed a 3-pointer out of a Maccabi timeout, Zizic put back a Wilbekin miss and then scored a jumper in the paint, Young answered with a triple while Cohen came back with a layup and one as Hapoel clung to a 45-44 lead at halftime.

Zizic put in the first points of the third quarter while Cohen followed it up with a pair of his own, but Brown scored from beyond the arc to keep pace, however, Wilbekin went from way, way downtown me Zizic added another bucket to give Maccabi a 53-48 lead midway through the period.

Young and Evans traded baskets, Zalmanson and Roman Sorkin then did the same but Wilbekin drilled home a 3-pointer and was fouled on the play, while Brown matched him at the other end and Timor each scored as Wilbekin put in a left handed ball to keep the yellow-and-blue in front 66-59 after thirty minutes of action.

Reynolds slammed the ball home and added more points in the paint, Timor and Young put in layups as did Tokoto to keep Hapoel within striking distance down 73-70 with 5:49 left in the fourth quarter. Brown with free throws, Zalmanson with a jumper and Brown with an uncontested layup gave Hapoel a 76-83 lead with 4 minutes remaining in regulation time.

Cohen scored a pair from the free throw line, Tokoto responded and Reynolds found points in the paint. Evans scored an acrobatic layup and free throw to even the score at 80-80 with a minute to go but Young hit a turnaround jumper over Blayzer and was fouled to retake the lead for good as Hapoel sewed up the Tel Aviv Derby 83-82.