{"id":500753,"date":"2017-09-25T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-09-25T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8080\/maccabis-sights-are-locked-on-season-opener\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T09:41:36","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T06:41:36","slug":"maccabis-sights-are-locked-on-season-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/maccabis-sights-are-locked-on-season-opener\/","title":{"rendered":"Maccabi&#8217;s sights are locked on season opener"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"responsive-video-container\" style=\"position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; margin-bottom: 20px;\"><iframe src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/Q0gx2PNQNVQ\" style=\"position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%;\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<div style=\"direction: ltr;\"> \t<span style=\"font-size:14px;\">Maccabi&#8217;s preparations for the upcoming season have entered to the final straight. And tonight (Monday) the team came back to Israel after the Crete <\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">tournament,<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\"> and will continue <\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">practicing<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\"> on Tuesday. On Thursday: EuroLeague media day and the traditional season opener press conference (will be broadcasted live on our website at 17:00 CET).<\/p>\n<p> \tHead Coach Neven Spahija was pleased with the team&#8217;s preseason: &#8220;We had a very good tournament, true we had ups and downs in the first preparation games but we played in a high intensity, the same level we are expected to have throughout the season. I see a great improvement in both our<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">defense<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\"> and in our <\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">offense<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">.<\/p>\n<p> \t&#8220;We&#8217;ve played against teams<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">in<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\"> various levels and in different intensity&#8221; Spahija added. &#8220;Kazan is a EuroLeague team, they are a team of high quality and the fact that they will play in the EuroCup doesn&#8217;t change that. We&#8217;ve played against them in a EuroLeague level and the most important thing for us is that we will continue playing in the same level of intensity and aggressiveness.&#8221;\u00a0<\/p>\n<p> \tThe Croatian coach also addressed the absence of Norris Cole who&#8217;s injured: &#8220;Norris is one of the most important players in our system, but we also have John DiBartolomeo who&#8217;s shown us very good things.<\/p>\n<p> \tPierre Jackson: &#8220;This tournament helped us a lot. We played against strong and competitive teams. I feel like Maccabi is ready for the new season as we had a good preseason.<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\">Personally<\/span><span style=\"font-size:14px;\"> I want to play my game and contribute to the team, and to play the best basketball I can.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p> \tYovel Zoosman who came back pleased after getting his chance: &#8220;I was happy for the chances that coach gave me. I dreamed about playing for Maccabi as a Kid, and I still dream about it. Our team is getting together slowly, we have chemistry, it&#8217;s taking us time but we&#8217;ll get there and we will be prepared.&#8221;<\/span><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Maccabi&#8217;s preparations for the upcoming season have entered to the final straight. And tonight (Monday) the team came back to Israel after the Crete tournament, and will continue practicing on Tuesday<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"custom_author":[],"class_list":["post-500753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-54"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500753","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=500753"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500753\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":500755,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/500753\/revisions\/500755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=500753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=500753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=500753"},{"taxonomy":"custom_author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/custom_author?post=500753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}