Kiryat Ata surprised Hapoel Holon 98-90 as Eldad Bentov’s squad built up a double digit lead in the second quarter and never looked back as they took home the win back to the north. Jordan McRae and Xavier Munford scored for Hapoel Holon while Tomer Asayag and Ilay Dolinski countered for Kiryat Ata but a dunk by Malik Hall as the first quarter came to an end gave the visitors a 21-20 lead.

Asayag and Hall along with Yuval Hochstader and Jemaya Neal found points for Eldad Bentov’s squad McRae and Hassan Martin responded for the hosts while Neal and Roi Rosenberg traded triples as Kiryat Ata took a 50-40 advantage into halftime.

Derrick Walton Jr. scored a trio of baskets to open up the third quarter, Malik Hall came back with points, McRae quickly went from the inside and outside, Noah Locke scored while Munford hit a 3-pointer to end the period as the purples cut the lead to 71-65 after thirty minutes of action. Yair Kravits and Netanel Artzi scored for Holon, Asayag, Hall and Darius Hannah countered while Locke scored as well to close out the win.

Locke scored 21 points, while Asayag and Neal added 17 points each in the victory while McRae scored 23 points, Walton scored 16 points and Martin put in 12 points in the loss.

“We looked at Holon in the whites of their eyes from the tip-off,” Kiryat Ata head coach Eldad Bentov said. “We had a lot of confidence and I’m so proud of the guys. This was a team win and everyone contributed to this victory which was our first here in Holon. I have ten players who did what they all needed to do in order to get this result.”

“We have to learn how to come and play in the league,” Hapoel Holon Head Coach Danny Franco began. “it’s easy to come and play Jerusalem but we have to know how to play all of the teams. We have some guys who haven’t played in the local league and we will all get onto the same page. We could have picked up a loss here that was really unnecessary.”

Darius Hannah spoke about the win, “It was a tough and good game we executed the game plan that we worked on all week and we played as a team which has been instilled into us by coach.”

Netanel Artzi summed up the loss, “We didn’t play the way we should have from the get go. Kiryat Ata came to play and we can’t look like the way we did here. This should be a good lesson and message for us. We will pull ourselves together and get ready for Friday’s game.”

Hapoel Beer Sheva clipped Maccabi Raanana 88-84 as the southern reds jumped out to an eating 32-19 lead after the opening quarter thanks to superb play by CJ Elleby who led the any with 29 points to give the hosts the hard earned win. In addition to Elleby, Cody Demps scored 17 points and Brandon Angel notched 15 points in the win as Lenard Freeman paced the visitors with 19 points, Yotam Hanochi scored 16 points and Hassan Diarra put in 15 points in the loss. Beer Sheva’s record bumped up to 2-3 with the win while Raanana now sports the same record.

Nes Ziona clobbered Hapoel Galil Elyon 81-55 as Amit Sherf’s squad won their first game of the season up at Kfar Blum in the Galilee. Bryce Brown who finished with 17 points got hot early on for the visitors to help grab a 23-16 lead after the first quarter and never looked back to notch the victory. Desi Rodriguez scored 18 points and Itay Moskovits added 13 points in the win as Cyril Langevine scored 17 points in the defeat. With the win, Nes Ziona is now 1-4 as Galil comes in at 2-3.

Hapoel HaEmek smashed Maccabi Ramat Gan 89-63 as Sharon Avrahami’s squad won every quarter of the game as Kyler Edwards (20 points) Kadin Shedrick (17 points) and Elijah Childs (16 points) all played pivotal roles to help the Gan Ner based team cruise to the victory. With the win, HaEmek moves to 4-1 while Ramat Gan drops to 2-3 early on in the season.