Hapoel Holon gets their Basketball Champions League campaign for the 2025/26 season underway on Wednesday night when they face Bursaspor in Szombathely, Hungary which has served as the club’s home away from home since the outbreak of the war with Hamas.

The purples under Head Coach Danny Franco’s tutelage have put together a squad that has a solid mix of veterans and newcomers but also includes players that have featured in Israel in the past.

One of those happens to be Jordan McRae who played for Franco during the 2022-23 season when they were both with Hapoel Tel Aviv. Just ahead of tip-off, The Sports Rabbi spoke to McRae about the new season, returning to Israel as well as a myriad of topics as he readies for yet another year of hooping abroad.

“I’m doing well, everything is good,” McRae began. “Excited to be back and everything feels great. This is a familiar place and I’m excited.”

McRae is not the only player who arrived in Holon that has been in Israel before as Xavier Munford is also here in Israel while a former teammate in big man Idan Zalamnson are on board together with coach Franco.

“The preseason has been going been well. As a team we’re learning each other for the first time, we got a lot of guys meeting for the first time so it’s going to take some time, but I think it’s going well. But it’s also good to always have somebody that you’re familiar with as a coach, myself and X are really close off the court and Zali, being able to have him, I know what he can do and have another familiar face in the locker room.

Franco is a coach who very much values players that have been in Israel before as they understand the league and in McRae’s case, he also is familiar with the bench boss and what he expects of his team. While there may be a reunion at Holon, it’s a totally new season.

“I wanted to come back. I had some other offers, but I talked to X and we wanted to team up again. Obviously Danny was a big part of that with him being the coach, so for myself to come back with X (Xavier Munford) and Danny, it was a no-brained. I think that year at Hapoel Tel Aviv was a fantastic. But I think we want to create our own magic here in Holon. What we did in Hapoel is in the past, so we’re just trying to create something new and exciting here.”

For the third consecutive season, Holon will be playing their games in Europe away from the friendly confines of the Holy Land due to the ongoing conflict with Hamas after they brutally attacked Israel on October 7, 2023. For the 34-year old, this will not be unfamiliar territory as he also played with no fans during the 23/24 season with AEK.

“It is what it is,” McRae said. “We already went down there for five days to kind of get familiar with the area and everything, so with us being able to be there for five days to get comfortable was big for us. It affects the game, of course, but we got a lot of vets on this team so in those kind of games we have to create our own energy and I think that will be a big thing for us.”

When McRae was with Hapoel, they were knocked out of the EuroCup quarterfinals and will play them once again now with Holon. However, he doesn’t feel that there is any unfinished business.

“No. We just know that they’re a really good team, they’re a Spanish team so they have really good experience and are really good, so just going into every game in the BCL is important because it’s a six game thing, you have to go into every game and know that every game is really important.”

Last season, McRae played for Scafati Basket in Italy but he had some issues throughout the year, “I was battling through an injury the whole year, I wasn’t who I normally am. I played on a torn meniscus for about 3-4 months, I tried to do it as long as I could and honestly I couldn’t do it.”

Today, Hapoel Tel Aviv is a Euroleague team but back when McRae was playing for the Reds it was just a dream. With that there is no question that the 22/23 season set the foundation for what was to come just a few years later, McRae explained.

“I would like to feel like I was part of it. I feel like what we did that year kind of put them on a launch pad for what they are today. I’m happy for them, I’m here at Holon and I’m trying to create that magic here.”

As for memories from one of the great finals series back in 2022/23, McRae had a huge performance in game 2 that was a win at the Drive In Arena but on the other hand, the heartbreaking loss at the end of game 3 was devastating.

“We were so close to making history then,” McRae recalled. “We fought as hard as we could, playing on the road with a game three is tough. There is nothing much you can say about it, we were inches away, but it didn’t happen.”

One of McRae’s teammates that season was Jaylen Hoard who now plays for Maccabi Tel Aviv and it was the forward who was able to give him a bit of advice and tips here and there in order to help him with his game.

“I don’t want to take credit for his career, but him and myself are still close friends, he actually came to my house this summer. He’s a basketball guy, loves to watch it and talk about it, me and him are talking during the year and he sends me highlights of stuff he is doing throughout the year, so that’s like a little brother of mine.”

McRae played for a bit in the Euroleague back at the start of the 2017/18 campaign but never had another chance to show his wares at the top level of European hoops despite having played in the NBA.
“I’ve done a lot of great things in my career, I’m 34 and playing well, but at this point of my career I’m just trying to do the best things possible with where I am and whatever happens the following year, I’ll worry about it then. 

McRae is one of the few NBA champions that have graced the courts across Israel having been a part of the 2016 Cleveland Cavaliers team that won the title with one of the greatest players in the history of the league, LeBron James.

“That was an amazing time in my career, I might have been like 24-25 or something. To have a chance to be on a team like that that will always be talked about in the history of the NBA feels good, no matter what role I played on that team I can always tell people I was on that team. I came back from 1-3, something that has never been done in the history. So just being able to be a part of that is amazing.” 

Seeing how LeBron James plays the game day in and day out was a special opportunity for McRae, “It sounds cliche, but just how he approaches the game, how he’s at the gym four-five hours early, how he works. It’s inspiring seeing him still do the same things that I’ve seen him do almost ten years ago.”

LeBron even gave McRae a special mention at the championship parade, “It felt good. That was a very close team that we were on, so being able just to be a part of that and part of history, the fact that we’re still talking about it now in 2025 and it happened in 2016, it’s crazy.”

As for goals this season, McRae was straight and to the point, “Personally I don’t have any personal goals. I want to stay healthy throughout the whole year, I feel like that’s first and foremost, but other than that just trying to get Holon back to where they were, trying to be part of that and like I said you want to make history wherever you go. We’re trying to strive towards that.”

As for being the league’s scoring leader, stuff like that I don’t really get into. I’ve been a scorer throughout my career, but whatever it takes to do to win, whether it would be scoring, rebounding, passing, defense – I’m willing to do. Those are young goals, when you’re 25-26 you want to do things like that. My focus is that I’m trying to win at all costs.”

McRae also spoke about what it’s like being a father and where he sees his post-playing career, “One of the biggest things I enjoy doing now is being a father. Those moments in the summer where you’re with your kids – they don’t care if you score 20 or 2, so just being with them takes the pressure off of everything. In the games where you have 20,000 people and you don’t play well and you are getting all kind of messages on Instagram and you call you’re kids – they couldn’t care less. That’s just something that’s amazing. After my career? I put some thought into it, but I’m still trying to figure out what it is that I’m trying to do.”

Being a coach is an option McRae explained, “There is a chance. I find myself that the older I get the more I can talk to a coach and being able to talk to Danny – we’re talking about different things on the level of schemes, defenses and stuff like that, so I love the game, the game has been very good to me, so if that happens I would love it.”

McRae does love Israel and considers it a very special place, “It’s a lot. I love the food, the people, the atmosphere of the basketball games, the basketball, the style in Israel. I really love the food in Israel, there’s so many different things you can have. Israel, like I said before, is another place I call home.”