.<\/FONT>
<\/P> Note: Advance tickets ($5 adults, $3 kids
5-15) are available at the
Springfield JCC, the Yiddish Book Center Bookstore in Amherst or by calling 413.231.5513 at the Basketball Hall of Fame.<\/FONT>
<\/P> (Separate page)<\/FONT>
<\/P> The Amazing Story of Tal Brody<\/U><\/B><\/FONT>
In 1965, New Jersey native Tal Brody, named to the All Big Ten First team and Sporting News All-American Top Ten, turned his back on his number-two draft spot on the Washington Bullets for a start-up team in Israel. Over the years, Tal became an idol to thousands of Israeli kids, returning home long enough to star in the U.S. National Team in the 1970 World Championships in Ljubljana, Slovenia and fulfill his US military obligation.<\/FONT>
Tal made Israel his permanent home in 1970 and was called up to serve in the Israel Defence Forces. Not only did he serve in both armies, but will go down in history as being the only individual who played on the National Teams of two countries.<\/FONT>
Tal who was both Captain of Maccabi Tel-Aviv and the Israeli National Team, represented Israel in the European Championships as well as in the 1974 Asian Games in Tehran, Iran, where Israel won the Gold Medal. With Maccabi Tel Aviv he won several National Championships, culminating with the 1977 European Champions Cup in Belgrade.<\/FONT>
During his playing career, Tal created basketball clinics for the younger generation and regularly lectured to coaches and students of physical education. Upon his retirement in 1980, he started his \u201cLet\u2019s Play Basketball Ball\u201d program which involved over 200,000 children all over Israel. In 1985, Tal launched one of the largest basketball programs in the world, based in Herzelia, a city of 100,000 on the outskirts of Tel Aviv. This program, called Bnei Herzelia, involves training 1,100 boys and girls from 5 to 18. Tal is currently President of the organization.<\/FONT><\/P> All this did not pass without appreciation and gratitude. Tal has won countless awards, among them the \u201cYedid Tel-Aviv\u201d and Dov Hoz Prizes by the City of Tel Aviv. On Independence Day 1980 he was honored by the President Yitshak Navon with the Israel Prize, the highest honor any Israeli citizen can receive.<\/FONT>
For his official retirement game, Maccabi Tel Aviv faced a European All-Star Selection Team before 10,000 in the Tel-Aviv Stadium with millions more watching the game and ceremonies on TV in Israel and Europe.<\/FONT><\/P> In 1981, Tal was chosen to carry and light the Maccabiah Torch at the Opening Ceremony of the Games before an audience of 45,000 at Ramat Gan Stadium.<\/FONT><\/P> Tal continues to be associated with Maccabi Tel Aviv,
handling special projects like the Goodwill Games that were played in the U.S. and in Tel Aviv against NBA teams. Every year he also sponsors the Special Olympics Basketball Tournament for the mentally retarded. <\/FONT>
During the 56th<\/SUP> Independence Day Celebrations, Tal was chosen to represent all of Israel\u2019s Sporting Heroes, past and present, in lighting the Independence Day Torch. <\/FONT><\/P><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cHoop it Up for Israel! Celebrate Israel\u2019s 60th Birthday\u201d fills the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield. In the spotlight will be the legendary Tal Brody<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"custom_author":[],"class_list":["post-27708","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-other"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27708","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27708"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27708\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":494519,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27708\/revisions\/494519"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27708"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27708"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27708"},{"taxonomy":"custom_author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/custom_author?post=27708"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}