{"id":506085,"date":"2020-10-01T12:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-10-01T09:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:8080\/this-was-an-unbelievably-gusty-win\/"},"modified":"2026-04-26T11:42:48","modified_gmt":"2026-04-26T08:42:48","slug":"this-was-an-unbelievably-gusty-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/this-was-an-unbelievably-gusty-win\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;This was an unbelievably gusty win&#8221;"},"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\/4O0HwlJVueM\" 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;\">\n<p style=\"font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small; color: rgb(14, 16, 26); margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\"> \t\t<span style=\"font-size:14px;\"><span style=\"margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">Despite playing only 2 preseason games against local opponents and not holding a training camp, Maccabi Playtika Tel Aviv got off to a winning start holding off Alba Berlin 80:73 at the non-seated Menora Mivtachim Arena. After the win, the Yellow &#038; Blue continued the tradition and thanked the empty seats.\u00a0<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p> \t\t<span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">&#8220;First of all, we played without fans and for me to play without them makes it feel like a cold atmosphere, and it&#8217;s not easy to play like that&#8221;, Said head coach\u00a0<\/span><strong style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">Giannis Sfairopoulos<\/strong><span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">\u00a0about the biggest challenge he has faced tonight. &#8220;The team and I are connected to the fans, we love them, and that&#8217;s why we dedicate this win for them&#8221;.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p> \t\t<span style=\"font-size: 14px;\">&#8220;My concern was how we would play a EuroLeague game because we hadn&#8217;t played in Europe since March, not even in the preseason. One of my biggest thoughts was how we would respond, and as you saw in the first period, we didn&#8217;t perform as we wanted, but after that, we got in the right spirit&#8221;, Spoke Sfairopoulos about how the game developed. &#8220;We had an excellent second period defensively, and offensively, we turned the game around, and from that moment, we took the lead and got a good win&#8221;.<\/span><\/p>\n<p> \t\t<span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">&#8220;We finished at the end of July, so we didn&#8217;t have the training camp, the preseason games, and the same preparation as the other EuroLeague teams had, so this was an unbelievably gusty win by us&#8221;, Said\u00a0<\/span><strong style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">Angelo Caloiaro\u00a0<\/strong><span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">after finishing as the top scorer with 18 points. &#8220;This is our third game of the season, and we were able to put it together against a very good Berlin team, so it&#8217;s pretty impressive, and I&#8217;m proud of the guys&#8221;.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p> \t\t<span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">Making his EuroLeague debut,\u00a0<\/span><strong style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">Chris Jones<\/strong><span style=\"font-size: 14px; margin-top: 0pt; margin-bottom: 0pt;\">\u00a0spoke about his great display scoring 12 points and dishing 7 assists: &#8220;I just came out and played basketball. My teammates and coaches made it easy for me to be comfortable out there. I am playing the game I love, and I had a great time, played hard, and got the win&#8221;.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Maccabi summarized the successful EuroLeague start. Sfairopoulos spoke about the fan&#8217;s absence: &#8220;The team and I are connected to the fans, we love them, and that&#8217;s why we dedicate this win for them&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":471270,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"custom_author":[],"class_list":["post-506085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-54"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506085","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=506085"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":506088,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/506085\/revisions\/506088"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/471270"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=506085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=506085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=506085"},{"taxonomy":"custom_author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/maccabi.co.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/custom_author?post=506085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}