Let me introduce myself.
That is what Saben Lee proclaimed when he raced down court, took a bounce pass from Levi Randolph, leaped high, high in the air with the ball curled in his hand and just demolished Anadolu EFES forward Ercan Osmani on the way to slamming it through the hoop sending those in attendance in Belgrade and probably everyone else watching on TV through the roof themselves.
Jaws dropped and hit the floor in no time as the shock and awe of the dunk reverberated across the European basketball world.
Incredible SLAMpic.twitter.com/jsuN8qGT7j
— Sports Rabbi (@thesportsrabbi) October 15, 2024
Here was Saben Lee, making his Euroleague debut and leading Maccabi to a dramatic 93-91 win over EFES after having spent four years muddling between the NBA and the G-League and following a couple of BCL games with Manisa. He arrived in Belgrade on Monday, met his new teammates later that day and showed all that he was more than ready for prime time continental hoops.
But it wasn’t just the dunk, it was how he ran the offense, became the center of the Maccabi universe and dished off the rock to Jaylen Hoard with time running down for the winning basket while also earning the game’s MVP award.
23 points, 6/8 from inside the arc, 2/2 from deep, 5/7 from the line to go with 5 assists which happens to also be his uniform number and it’s clear as day that the yellow-and-blue got themselves a real steal of a deal and one that made everyone very quickly forget about the loss of Jordan Loyd.

Saben Lee – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
Lee, who was born in St. Louis, grew up in Phoenix and attended high school in Tempe where he was named to the All-State First Team in both his Junior and Senior years at Corona del Sol. from there it was of to Vanderbilt where he quickly became the starting point guard as a freshman and spent three years with the Commodores before declaring for the 2020 NBA Draft where he was selected in the second round, 38th overall by the Utah Jazz.
From there, 6”2 Lee was traded to the Detroit Pistons and bounced around between them, the 76ers, his hometown Phoenix Suns and the G-League on two-way, 10-day and Exhibit 10 contracts before finally deciding it was time to head overseas where he could blossom into the player that he felt he could be.
Manisa in Turkey was a soft landing spot for the guard and allowed him to not only play in one of the best domestic leagues in Europe but also a chance to taste continental hoops in the Basketball Champions League. However, it didn’t take Lee long to master the BCL, roughly a pair of games in which he scored 43 and 36 points respectively and raised eyebrows around the continent.

Saben Lee – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
Luckily for Maccabi, despite the war and the fact that home Euroleague games will be played in Serbia, the yellow-and-blue were able to ink Lee to a 2-year deal with an out clause after the first season. Of course, according to reports it seems that Lee won’t be coming to Israel anytime soon and will only play in the Euroleague, but at this point beggars can’t be choosers and Maccabi needs to be competitive now in Europe and can worry about the Israeli league later on.
How long will Lee be with Maccabi? Will it be one season or two, that remains to be seen but regardless, for both the club and player the match seems to make plenty of sense as the 25-year old will have plenty of opportunities to gain experience in Europe and the yellow-and-blue will reap the benefits of his play just as they did in their win over EFES to move their record to 2-1 after three games.
There’s no question it’s a rare occurrence to have a player meet the team and less than 24 hours later he is the star of the show, but Head Coach Oded Katash had very little choice due to the absences of Rokas Jokubaitis and Wenyan Gabriel due to injury and the fact that Maccabi was also missing a guard when Daryl Macon was not going to be a help to the team also because of an injury.

Saben Lee – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
“We taught Saben the plays off the blackboard and we didn’t know what we were going to get,” the Maccabi tactician said. “I am really happy for everyone and that Saben was able to come into the team with ease. Losing Jordan Loyd was a big hit and we really liked what he gave us but now we hope that Lee can step into his shoes, he has a lot of potential. We have to give him credit, in half of a practice he learnt 4-5 plays and he had to connect defensively but he is really smart and really talented and we are really happy having him with us. But we still need to strengthen our squad.”
Jaylen Hoard was the beneficiary of Lee’s last second pass as the forward scored the game winning basket in the the paint. He wasn’t surprised one bit as to what Lee was able to do in the game and what he will be able to do going forward.
“I was telling my family when we signed Saben that if he can score in America and he can score in the BCL 40 points then it’s not an accident. What he did in this game was impressive but I am not surprised. It was a good game for him for sure.”

Jaylen Hoard – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
Maccabi and Katash couldn’t have scripted the win any better and there is no question that the bench boss was concerned, very concerned how his team was going to perform in this Euroleague Double Week. But as he said at the end of the Nes Ziona win that miracles do happen and in this case that’s what did occur as everything came together just so for the Israeli league champs.
“I liked the attitude,” Katash commented. “When we were struggling in the first half we stayed in the game and as the game continued we gained more confidence. We tightened up defensively as well. We played against a very good team with a lot of great players.”
Heard added, “It felt good and it was a big win. We didn’t know what to expect coming into the game and we had a long travel day and Saben just got to the team so we didn’t know how everything would go but it felt like everybody paid attention to the game plan and played hard and played together. Over the course of the game we focused more on defense and rebounding and that helped us a lot.”

Saben Lee – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
With one win in the first double week of the campaign in the bag, it’s time to begin preparing for a team in Partizan Belgrade that brought in not one or two new players, but 14(!) as legendary coach Zeljko Obradovic remade his entire squad save for a pair of young Serbian players. Partizan picked up their first win of the season this week with a 86-78 victory over Bayern Munich after dropping their opening two games and will look to start collecting victories in order to duplicate Panathinaikos’s success that saw a brand new roster win the championship last year.
But Katash also knows that his Maccabi can beat Partizan and that they are still a better team with many holdovers from the previous year plus this will be a home game for the yellow-and-blue at the Pionir Arena. With a chance to pick up an unlikely sweep especially with Lee in the lineup as he will once again look to introduce himself to even more and more people and show them what he can do, Maccabi has to be feeling pretty good after having lost both Jordan Loyd and the game at Monaco last week.
“At the start of the season you see a lot more surprises as teams are still trying to find themselves. We will need to find a way to compete and play against Partizan in two days. Usually in a double week you don’t have a lot of time to prepare and you need time to recover. We have to show up with the same mentality, same character and same commitment.”

Saben Lee – Photo credit: Djordje Kostic
If his first game was any indication, Lee has the mentality, character and commitment that Katash appreciates and will no doubt be a factor in his second clash with Maccabi. Can Lee help his new team to a second win in as many days? As Katash said miracles happen.
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