Hapoel Tel Aviv cruised past Bnei Herzliya 97-79 as five Reds scored in double digits to notch their first home win of the season. Stefanos Dedas’s squad who did not have Patrick Beverley available for the game, jumped all over the visitors from the get go as the hosts hit a slew of 3-pointers while Tomer Ginat, Ish Wainright, Johnathan Motley, Marcus and Bruno Caboclo did as they pleased to take the 18-point win.

Ginat and Wainright each scored 19 points, Motley added 14 points, Foster scored 13 points and Caboclo chipped in with 12 points in the win. Jimmy Clark scored 20 points, John Meeks put in 15 points and Ethan Burg scored 12 points in the loss.

“We scored 97 points with 19 turnovers and 26 assists without really our top two point guards,” Dedas began after the game. “We shot well but we had to take care of the ball a bit more. They had about 50 misses and they grabbed many rebounds because of that. We beat a good team and that was our 5th win in a row which is important.”

“I know we’ve received a lot of respect and compliments so far this season but we lost and that’s the bottom line for me,” Herzliya coach Yehu Orland said. “Bruno Caboclo and Johnathan Motley are quality players but when you play against them you aren’t thinking about that. We gave up a number of 3-pointers to them and we hadn’t taken that into account coming into the game. We have a lot of respect for Hapoel but we were coming in to this game to play.”

Ish Wainright spoke about the win, “Coach had a good plan and we had fun out there as we took care of business. I’m going to have fun all season here and do what I need to. The fans were amazing but I heard we have a lot more fans and I can’t wait to have the full effect.”

Jimmy Clark looked back at the defeat and spoke about playing in Israel, “We played a pretty good offensive team and we got off to a slow start, but we didn’t quit. I like the league, being in Israel is a different environment and it was similar to what I experienced in college last year.”

Hapoel Tel Aviv were raining 3’s out of the gate as Bar Timor, Johnathan Motley, Ish Wainright and Bruno Caboclo all went for deep for the Reds while Josh Hawley paced Bnei Herzliya as the hosts took a 24-16 lead after ten minutes. Marcus Foster continued the 3-point barrage as did Caboclo with points from the inside and outside while Ethan Burg tried to keep Yehu Orland’s team close but another triple from Wainright along with points from Tomer Ginat and Timor gave Stefanos Dedas’s squad a 47-33 advantage at halftime.

Ginat started scoring with ease to begin the third quarter, John Meeks and Frederic Bourdillon hit 3-pointers to try and keep the score respectable but Wainright filled the basket on the inside and outside to give Hapoel a 74-54 lead after thirty minutes of action. Meeks and Bourdillon continued to score for Herzliya while Jimmy Clark also found the bottom of the basket to cut the lead down to 11-points, but Wainright from the corner and then under the bucket along with points from Foster and Motley polished off the win.

Hapoel Haifa defeated Elitzur Netanya 94-85 in a spirited game that was decided in overtime by the Carmel mountain. The diamond city squad jumped out in front of the hosts with strong play from Cody Demps, Itay Moskowitz and Roy Paretzky but Cameron Young and Amit Gershon helped the Carmel Reds into the lead as the game neared the end of regulation time.

However, a huge triple by Netanya’s Shachar Doron sent the matchup into the extra session where the visitors ran out of gas as Tyler Bey and Daniel Rosenbaum spurred Haifa to the victory. Bey scored 22 points, Young added 20 points and Gershon chipped in with 19 points in the win while Paretzky scored 22 points, Moskowitz out in 16 points and Demps scored 15 points in the loss.