Maccabi Strolls Past Ashkelon 88 – 66

By Amy Samin



In the second meeting between the teams this season, Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv defeated Irony Ashkelon 88 – 66.
Doron Perkins led the way with 18 points, 5 assists and 5 steals; Blu (17) and Burstein (11) also had excellent games.
Newcomer Milan Mačvan made his Israeli League debut, scoring 4 points, and pulling down 3 rebounds in 14 minutes.
The injured Eliyahu did not suit up.

Guy Pnini, David Blu, Jeremy Pargo, Sofoklis Schortsanitis, and Doron Perkins started the game for Maccabi and looked strong in the opening minutes.
A shot from outside the arc by Pargo was quickly followed by one from Perk, who went on to grab a steal and fire off a snazzy assist to Pnini; after three minutes Maccabi’s lead was 12 – 2.
Maccabi’s full court press was in evidence, as was good ball movement by the home team, as a steal by Blu led to an assist by Perk to Pnini for the layup, 14 – 4.
Strong defense forced Ashkelon into a shot clock violation and kept the visitors under ten points for most of the period, while Blu and co-captain Tal Burstein drained threes.
A layup by Sofo at the buzzer set the score at 22 – 11 after one quarter.

Maccabi’s big men opened the second quarter, with points by Sofo and Mačvan making it 26 – 11 after two minutes of play.
Fouls by Ashkelon put Perkins on the charity stripe, where he extended Maccabi’s lead to 32 – 18 with four and a half minutes left in the half.
A fantastic block by Yaniv Green was recovered by Ashkelon’s Desmon Farmer, who scored from three-point range to make it 33 – 23. The visitors foug

ht to narrow the gap further, and at the half Maccabi led by six, 39 – 33.
Maccabi’s advantage stayed more or less the same in the early minutes of the second half, until Perk and Chuck Eidson went to town with steals, assists and dunks.
Eidson’s fake dunk-turned-assist to Perkins for the dunk gave Maccabi a thirteen point lead near the halfway mark in the quarter, 50 – 37.
A three by Farmer shut down Maccabi’s scoring run, but was quickly answered by three from the corner by the master of catch and shoot, Blu, 55 – 42.
Blu scored again under the basket off an assist from Pargo, and the third period ended with Maccabi leading 61 – 49.

Both teams looked sluggish at the start of the fourth quarter, until a three from Pargo at the top of the arc got Maccabi fired up.
A long two from Blu in the corner was followed by a three from Pnini from the same spot and huge blocks by Sofo and Perkins at the other end, making it 74 – 56 with half of the period gone.
Ashkelon did not concede defeat and continued to fight for points, but in the end Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv notched up its tenth win in the Lotto League with an 88 – 66 victory over Ironi Eldan Ashkelon.

Box Scores:

Maccabi: Perkins 18 points, 5 assists, 5 steals; Blu 17 points; Burstein 11 points; Pargo 9 points, 5 assists; Pnini 9 points; Eidson 8 points, 6 assists; Schortsanitis 8 points; Green and Mačvan 4 points each.

After the game, head coach David Blatt said, “According to the index and our percentages from two point range, we should have won by a lot more than 22 points.
Every time we could have broken the game wide open, we messed up.
We didn’t play responsibly; we took bad shots from outside.
We didn’t go to the inside, like we usually do.”

Blatt also expressed his displeasure over the lack of a break over the Christmas holiday, “The fact that there was no break shows a lack of consideration for our foreign players.
In every normal country and place of work they give employees vacation time.
In the middle of the season, it’s also necessary.
There are players who are injured, some are sick, and a break could help, not just the foreigners but the whole system.”

Doron Perkins, who was outstanding with 18 points, 5 steals, and 5 assists, added, “It didn’t look as pretty as the coach wanted it to, but it was a good test for us.
Not everything went the way we wanted it to, but we played through it.
We played hard and we won and we played a good second half.”

www.samintranslations.com