Israel came up short to Greece 84-79 in the Eurobasket Round of 16 and were eliminated from the competition. After a pair of stunners with Serbia and France being knocked out by Finland and Georgia respectively, Israel hoped that they would add their name to the list of giant slayers but it was not meant to be.

Giannis Antetokounmpo did as he pleased throughout the contest as Deni Avdija the blue-and-white couldn’t find their rhythm over the course of the 40 minutes as Ariel Beit Halachmi’s squad headed home with mixed results but having played in the knockout round for the first time since 2015.

Antetokounmpo scored 37 points and grabbed 10 rebounds, Sloukas added 11 points and Papnikolau scored 8 points in the win. Avdija scored 23 points, Ginat added 15 points and Sorkin scored 14 points in the loss.

“We wanted to keep going after few days but we left it all on the court,” Head Coach Ariel Beit Halachmi said. “I have to give credit to everyone for the past couple of months. We will come home proud and the most important thing was to give the fans at home something to be happy about which is what we did. As for the game we didn’t win the battle of the boards and we played one of the world’s best players. I’m happy the way we played throughout the entire tournament.”

Roman Sorkin spoke about the game, ”We couldn’t stop Giannis and he scored 37 points but we were fine against the others. I’m proud of everyone here. We were all really close and the situation at home made sure we gave our all. We didn’t want to lose and we wanted to continue on and give some joy and pride to our country.”

Greece got off to a quick start as Giannis Antetokounmpo did as he pleased against Itay Segev while Kostas Papanikolau also found points, as Tomer Ginat and Yam Madar answered for Israel but ended the first quarter down 28-22 after ten minutes of play. Roman Sorkin and Antetokounmpo scored for their respective squads, Deni Avdija went from deep, Kostantinos Mitoglu scored at the other end as did Kostas Sloukas and Tyler Dorsey to put Greece in front 50-41 at halftime.

Sorkin, Khadeen Carrington and Avdija all went from downtown, Antetokounmpo scored a trio of baskets, Sloukas put in a 3-point play and Alexandros Samodurov went from deep to bump up the lead to 67-59 after thirty minutes of action. Sloukas, Antetokounmpo and Samodurov al scored to get the final frame underway, Avdija and Madar countered, but points from Papanikolau along with a layup and dunk from Antetokounmpo wrapped up the game for Greece.