Maccabi Tel Aviv demolished Nes Ziona 88-66 to get back on the winning track ahead of their Euroleague quarterfinal matchup against Monaco beginning next week. The yellow-and-blue raced out to a quick lead and never looked back as Darrun Hilliard with 18 points, Alex Poythress who added 16 points and Jake Cohen with 13 points all scored double figures as Wade Baldwin dished out 10 assists in the victory. Tyler Bey with 20 points and Jerome Meyinsee added 18 points in the loss.

Darrun Hilliard opened up the game by drilling home a pair from deep while Josh Nebo and Jarrell Martin also scored for Maccabi Tel Aviv but Jerome Meyinsse and Tyler Bey responded for Nes Ziona, however, the visitors took a 27-21 lead after ten minutes of play. Jake Cohen began to find the basket and Hilliard kept scoring at will as Tomer Levinson and Meyinsse tried to keep the hosts close but Hilliard went from deep at the buzzer to give the yellow-and-blue a 49-35 lead at halftime.

Wade Baldwin began to score as Alex Poythress and Cohen also found the bottom of the basket for Oded Katash’s squad while Meyinsse and Bey countered for Elad Hasin’s team but Maccabi continued to stay in front 66-52 after thirty minutes of action. Iftach Ziv scored his first points of the game from long distance of lead off the fourth quarter, Roman Sorkin, Guy Pnini and Poythress scored at will to polish off an overmatched Nes Ziona

“This was a good game for us after a loss,” Maccabi coach Oded Katash began. “We focused, we split the minutes up, we played defense and we stayed healthy which was what we wanted to do in his game. This was important for us as we always want to bring the team into a game with the right energy. But what’s unique is that these guys know how to react after a loss and we have done that all season long and haven’t gotten into a slump.”

Katash then turned his sights onto the upcoming series against Monaco, “It’s was tough the last few days as we were thinking about Monaco and we had to work on these two games in the league. Now we have to really put our thoughts and energy into the series and we want to have everyone ready for our practice on Saturday night.”

Jake Cohen also spoke about getting ready for the Euroleague playoffs, “We will be ready by game one and we wanted to take care of these games. We bounced back nicely and it will be a great series and they are great at home. We have our work cut out for us. We are in the playoffs and we have a great chance to go to the final four. We put ourselves in a great opportunity to do something special.”