Hapoel Jerusalem fell to Tenerife 95-92 as their Basketball Champions League record dropped to 3-1 and will have to wait until next week when they face Peristeri in order to clinch a place in the quarterfinals.

Marcelinho Huertas and Tim Abromaitis scored at will to begin the game for Tenerife while Zach Hankins and Or Cornelius responded for Hapoel Jerusalem but Jaime Fernandez’s basket gave the hosts a 24-21 lead after ten minutes of play. Speedy Smith started to find points in the second quarter while Levi Randolph also scored but Huertas kept filling the hoop as did Joan Sastre, Kyle Guy and Bruno Fitipaldo to give the hosts a 46-34 advantage at halftime.

Giorgi Shermadini and Sastre began the third quarter by extending the lead, Chris Johnson and Randolph responded as did Hankins, but points by Elgin Cook and Sastre kept Tenerife in front 66-60 after thirty minutes of action. Hankins and Khadeen Carrington scored, Jaime Fernandez scored a pair of baskets, Guy went from the inside and outside, Sastre again scored as did Huertas who sealed the win.

Randolph scored 20 points, Johnson added 17 points and Smith chipped in with 12 points in the loss. Huertas scored 24 points, Sastre checked in with 22 points and Guy scored 15 points in the win.

“I believe that Tenerife was able to input their way of basketball, their offensive game with a lot of pick and rolls and offensive flow,” Jerusalem coach Ilias Kantzouris said. “That with some small details cost us the game. We tried more as team in the second half but to win these games you need to take care of those small details.”

Levi Randolph spoke about the game that was, “It was a tough game and we knew what we were walking into Tenerife who is a really good team with a long history of playing great basketball. We want to continue to get better, we fought really hard but we have to get back to our identity of getting stops, playing defense rotating and helping each other. We don’t hang our hats on the offensive side and we focus on defense, it cost us in this game with the little mistakes addling up.”

Joan Sastre shared his thoughts on the win, “It was a very tough game for 40 minutes which we expected. We are very happy for the win and it was an important one against one of the best teams in the competition.”