The Yellow & Blue summarized the victory over Rishon LeZion. Sfairopoulos: “This game helped us get back our rhythm”. Avdija: “It’s our time to get back into that rhythm, to be on that positive drive towards the back end of the season”
Maccabi Fox Tel Aviv broke a 61 tie early in the fourth quarter to finish the game on a 14:3 run on it’s way to their 14th straight league win over Maccabi Rishon LeZion, 75:64. Tyler Dorsey came off the bench and led all scorers with 19 points adding to that 5 assists and 5 rebounds, Othello Hunter dominated in the paint scoring 16 points while grabbing 9 rebounds as Deni Avidja, who wasn’t 100% healthy coming into the game, finished the night with 12 points and 7 rebounds. On Friday night, the Yellow & Blue return to EuroLeague action as they head out to Spain to face Valencia.
“I want to congratulate our players for the win, it was crucial to get the win, especially after we didn’t play good tonight”, Said head coach Giannis Sfairopoulos after the 18th league of the season. “The most important thing is that this game helped us get back our rhythm. I’m happy the way we performed in the last period, we allowed only 9 points, and that was key to winning the game. After they tied the game, we showed our character and won the game”.
“We are in Maccabi Tel Aviv, we try to win all the games. This win is vital for us because we played against an excellent team, especially this year, by the way, they are in the standings”, Explained Sfairopoulos about this league win. “I believe that no matter how we play, a win is a win. We need to understand that we are all committed to winning as much as many games as possible. We are humans, we can lose games as there are no unbeaten teams, but the most important thing is to fight in all of the games. Even if we don’t play well like today, we need to keep our same mentality that is to win every single game knowing for which team we play for”.
“This season, every game is intense because each team we play against gives all of their efforts versus us”, Said Deni Avdija at the post-game press conference. “We need to do the shift between the EuroLeague and the Israeli league, and it’s not our first time doing that shift in our minds as we are an experienced team with a lot of veterans and a great coaching staff that knows how to prepare us for each game”.
“It really hurt all of us that we weren’t a part of the Cup week because we are mentally winners, and we want to play in the highest stages”, Added the young forward. “The unexpected rest gave some players time to recover and gain energy for the rest of the season. Tonight was the first game Scottie is back, Elijah and I came in a bit sick, We might not be injured, but it took us a couple of days to recover”.
“However, now it’s just getting back in rhythm as basketball is a game of momentums, it’s our time to get back into that rhythm”, Explained Avdija. “We have a tough road matchup against Valencia, hopefully, we will win it and start to be on that positive drive towards the back end of the season”.
