{"id":20461,"date":"2020-07-24T06:15:10","date_gmt":"2020-07-24T06:15:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportsrabbi.com\/?p=20461"},"modified":"2020-07-24T06:15:10","modified_gmt":"2020-07-24T06:15:10","slug":"jerusalem-is-a-stronger-team-on-paper-rishon-lezion-and-jerusalem-look-ahead-to-sundays-semifinal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportsrabbi.com\/en\/jerusalem-is-a-stronger-team-on-paper-rishon-lezion-and-jerusalem-look-ahead-to-sundays-semifinal\/","title":{"rendered":"“Jerusalem is a stronger team on paper” Rishon Le’Zion and Jerusalem look ahead to Sunday’s Semifinal"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Israel Basketball Winner League held a press conference ahead of Sunday\u2019s first semifinal matchup between Hapoel Jerusalem and Maccabi Rishon Le\u2019Zion slated to tipoff at 18:30 Israel time.<\/p>\n

Last season, Rishon Le\u2019Zion had the upper hand when the two squads faced each other in semifinal but so fair this season it\u2019s been all Jerusalem with the Reds winning all five clashes.
\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dov Halickman Photography<\/p><\/div>
\nRead Coach Oded Katash spoke about the challenge at hand:<\/strong>
\n“We\u2019re excited and it feels like a regular Final 4. Although everything has changed and there won’t be fans and various other things, however, I\u2019ve been pleased at how things have turned out and it\u2019s been better than I expected.”<\/p>\n

About having a week off between games:<\/strong>
\n“I think we needed it and we wanted to get ready, but it\u2019s been good for us. We know how this might factor in and we didn\u2019t know how yesterday\u2019s games would end up but for us I\u2019ve been happy to have the time and we will be ready to go.”
\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dov Halickman Photography<\/p><\/div>
\nJerusalem Captain Bar Timor also looked ahead to the semifinal clash:<\/strong>
\n“Not having fans is not great especilly for us. But we have one game coming up and we will be ready to play.<\/p>\n

The fact that Rishon beat Jerusalem last season in the semifinals:<\/strong>
\n“I don\u2019t think it\u2019s in our head that we lost last year but there aren\u2019t any favorites in this game at all.”
\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dov Halickman Photography<\/p><\/div>
\nRishon bench boss Guy Goodes discussed the mission ahead:<\/strong>
\n“I believe that we are coming into the game very prepared and we have been able to work well with the players going into the contest. The players got used to the quarantine issue and they are ready both physically and mentally.” <\/p>\n

Not begin able to defeat the Reds this season:<\/strong>
\n“The fact that we lost five times shows Jerusalem\u2019s strength but that also gives us motivation to surprise them.”<\/p>\n

More about the contest:<\/strong>
\n“We have to come into the game mentally strong and play good basketball as we haven\u2019t scored well from 3 against Jerusalem. Their bench is aggressive and strong. But anything can happen in one game. That\u2019s the advantage of a one game winner take all which happened last year. But on paper Jerusalem the a stronger team everyone will agree to that.”
\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dov Halickman Photography<\/p><\/div>
\nOz Blayzer, Rishon’s captain also spoke about the one game do or die game:<\/strong>
\n“We are here to fight for the title and we believe in ourselves and deposited losing five times, we saw last year what can happen and we have to play 40 minutes in order to win.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Israel Basketball Winner League held a press conference ahead of Sunday\u2019s first semifinal matchup between Hapoel Jerusalem and Maccabi Rishon Le\u2019Zion slated to tipoff at 18:30 Israel time. Last season, Rishon Le\u2019Zion had the upper hand when the two squads faced each other in semifinal but so fair this season it\u2019s been all Jerusalem […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":20463,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[168,127,96,64,187,83],"class_list":["post-20461","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-holy-land-hoops","tag-bar-timor","tag-guy-goodes","tag-hapoel-jerusalem","tag-maccabi-rishon-lezion","tag-oded-katash","tag-oz-blayzer","et-has-post-format-content","et_post_format-et-post-format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\n"Jerusalem is a stronger team on paper" Rishon Le'Zion and Jerusalem look ahead to Sunday's Semifinal - Sports Rabbi<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/sportsrabbi.com\/en\/jerusalem-is-a-stronger-team-on-paper-rishon-lezion-and-jerusalem-look-ahead-to-sundays-semifinal\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\""Jerusalem is a stronger team on paper" Rishon Le'Zion and Jerusalem look ahead to Sunday's Semifinal - Sports Rabbi\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The Israel Basketball Winner League held a press conference ahead of Sunday\u2019s first semifinal matchup between Hapoel Jerusalem and Maccabi Rishon Le\u2019Zion slated to tipoff at 18:30 Israel time. 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