The Israeli basketball league is coming back to life as the players begin to arrive in the Holy Land for the 2026-27 season with training camps beginning next week across the country.

Hapoel Jerusalem’s Jared Harper landed at Ben Gurion Airport and returns to be the cornerstone of the Reds brand new roster under veteran head coach Sasa Obradovic. The Serbian tactician has one goal in mind and that is to ensure that the club can finish at the top of the EuroCup and earn a place in the continent’s top competition, the Euroleague.

The guard shared his first thoughts about what the expectations will be for Jerusalem this coming campaign, “I feel good and I think it’s going to be different than last year. Obviously, a new coach, it’s going to be a new system and a lot of new players. So, it’s going to take some time for us to get together and be able to adjust and try to learn as much as we can fast to meet our goals that we have for the season.”

Harper knows that while there is plenty of talent on the roster it will take some time to build chemistry, “We made a lot of new additions. I think we picked up a lot of good pieces with talent, people with experience and a lot of different things and I think we’re going to be able to play and show different things to be able to win in different ways.”

“But it’s going to take the effort from everybody from day one to build that chemistry that’s a little bit different than last year, having some of us played longer together and just made a couple additions. But now we have a lot of additions and a couple people that returned. So, it’s kind of the opposite. But it’s going to take us coming together and being able to put it all together.”

Harper had a number of conversations with Obradovic about how he views the guard’s contribution to the team, “We’ve had a couple of conversations, kind of brief, but I think the biggest takeaway for me is just to continue to step up as a leader, just with my experience in Europe in general. We have people that are a little bit newer to Europe, so being able to help those guys out, my experience here in Israel, my experience here with the team, all those things kind of go hand-in-hand. So, me being a bigger leader is, I would say, the biggest takeaway.”

Over the past couple of years, Harper has captured back-to-back MVP awards in the EuroCup and there has been a lot of interest in the floor general from top level clubs, but nonetheless Harper decided to stay with the Reds and sign a multi-year extension.

“I think just with the level of player that I’ve been, of course, I’m going to have interest from other teams. That’s kind of how that works. But for me, I want to be able to win and I want to be able to win here at Jerusalem. I think that’s one of the biggest things for me. So, I think it’s going to be a great year for that to happen.”

Of course, Jerusalem has been trying to win the title and Harper wants this year to be the year it happens, “Oh, I’m definitely ready. I think on a personal level, a little bit last year, coming into the season, I was struggling from an ankle injury that happened in the last game of the previous season. So, my summer workouts and what I was able to do looked a lot different last summer than they did this summer.

“I feel a lot better coming into the season this year, personally, being able to work out and work on the different things that I’m usually able to work on. So, I’m excited and I think this is the perfect time to go win a European championship and even all the championships here in Israel. That’s our goals for this year and we’re looking to go with that.”