Maccabi Tel Aviv defeated Armani Milano 97-79 to record their first Euroleague win of the season in convincing fashion at their home away from home in Belgrade, Serbia due to the security situation in Israel. Jaylen Hoard and Yam Madar had the hot hands early on while Moses Wright countered for the visitors but points from Iffe Lundberg, Daniel Theis and Bonzie Colson kept Oded Katash’s team ahead for good to north the victory.

The yellow-and-blue will now ready to open the Israeli league season on Saturday night when Hapoel Galil Elyon comes to town which will be followed up with a Euroleague Spanish Double Week with games at Barcelona and Valencia. Madar scored 17 points, Hoard and Colson added 13 points each while Sorkin out in 12 points in the win while Wright scored 23 points and Peters scored 12 points in the loss.

Maccabi Head Coach Oded Katash looked back at the victory, “This was an important win for us after our start to the Euroleague season, we started building our confidence back and I liked the body language and how aggressive we were. In the second half we looked even more comfortable. We got a lot of good minutes from a lot of the players and we kept things simple to find a way to win.”

The MVP Yam Madar spoke about the win, “It was big win for us after the way we started the Euroleague season. We are really happy for this one and this is a step in the right direction. We didn’t think we would start the season the way we did, but we want to play the right way and play for the fans. The win was the most important thing after opening the season 0-3.

“We didn’t start the season off the way we wanted too,” Jaylen Hoard said following the game. We watched a lot of film this week to try and correct mistakes. we want i try ti play better and improve throughout the sseaon, we rook a step forward against Jerusalem and there were things e learnt form that game and we took that into this game.”

Jaylen Hoard scored for Maccabi Tel Aviv, Moses Wright countered for Milano, Yam Madar and Daniel Theis also scored while Marko Guduric found points but a triple by Keaton Wallace kept the yellow-and-blue in front 24-20 after ten minutes of play. Armando Bacot went from the outside and inside to begin the second quarter, Hoard, Theis, Madar and Iffe Lundberg filled the bucket, Alec Peters and Wright continued to score for the Italians but Jimmy Clark’s first points of the game kept Oded Katash’s team in front 51-45 at halftime.

Madar and Wright traded baskets to start off the third quarter, Peters and Lundberg did the same, Sorkin and Garrison Matthews each went from deep while Wallace did the same as Clark went from downtown to give Maccabi a 74-62 lead after thirty minutes of action. Colson dropped a trio of deuces to get the final frame underway and then added one from deep, Clark added a pair of baskets, Hoard scored yet again and Sorkin out down an exclamation mark dunk to close out the victory.