By Amy Samin

Raviv Limonad, Guy Pnini, Andrew Wisniewski, Chuck Eidson and D’or Fischer opened for Maccabi, while Holon led off with Lior Lipshits, Antonio Graves, Sasa Bratic, Sean Daniel and John Thomas.

The visitors opened strong in the first period, with Graves, Thomas and Lipshits scoring to give Holon a 9 – 5 lead after two and a half minutes.
Eidson responded with a dunk off an assist by Pnini, and thanks to a three by David Bluthenthal, who had come into the game for Pnini, Maccabi closed within one, 13 – 12 at the halfway mark.
Thomas scored again for Holon, but Eidson drilled one from the corner to tie the game at 15.
Thomas continued to score for Holon, while Eidson did everything he could to disrupt their offense.
A pretty reverse layup and two from the charity stripe by Wiz gave Maccabi a 22 – 21 lead with just under two minutes left on the clock.
That was the start of a 10 – 0 scoring run for the home team, with Stephane Lasme and Doron Perkins contributing, and Bluthenthal scoring from way beyond the top of the arc.
The quarter ended with Maccabi leading 30 – 21.

Alan Anderson got things started in the second quarter with a three pointer after only ten seconds had elapsed.
Perkins was on fire defensively, breaking up plays and stealing the ball from Holon.
Bluthenthal added a couple more from under the basket and another from downtown to make it 40 – 29, Maccabi, after three minutes.
Anderson sent a perfect alley oop to Perkins, but Holon woke up and scored eight straight, 42 – 39.
Eidson threw down a putback off a miss by Lasme, and then sent an oop to Stephane for another dunk; with two minutes on the clock Maccabi led by seven, 48 – 41.
Limonad’s layup plus foul turned into a four point play when Pnini grabbed the missed free throw and made it 52 – 43, Maccabi.
Perkins smacked down a huge block at the other end to keep Maccabi’s lead at nine going into the halftime break.

The third quarter started out like a replay of the second, with three from the corner by Anderson.
Wisniewski added one from the left wing less than a minute later.
Pnini added two points in the paint as well as three from outside the arc, putting Maccabi up 63 – 48 after three and a half minutes of play.
Limonad was a demon on defense, disrupting Holon’s offense with repeated steals.
Fischer’s dunk off an assist from Anderson made it 70 – 53, Maccabi.
Titus Ivory’s three-pointer for Holon wasn’t much help, and was answered by one of Fish’s pretty mid-range jumpers.
Wiz drained another three from the left wing, and Yaniv Green sent home a dunk after being on the court for only a minute.
Two shot clock violations for Holon were the result of excellent defense by Maccabi.
Pnini’s bucket with seconds left on the clock gave Maccabi a twenty point lead at the end of three, 79 – 59.

To make the game perfect in the eyes of Maccabi fans, team captain Derrick Sharp was in the starting line up for the fourth quarter.
He brought the crowd to their feet with one of his classic threes from the corner.
Green slammed home a putback dunk but Holon scored seven straight and after three and a half minutes the score stood at 85 – 69.
Sharp scored twice in succession, and halfway through the final period Maccabi’s lead was 90 – 71.
Holon scored seven more straight points and managed to close within nine, 92 – 83, until a layup by Green broke the momentum.
Green contributed even more by dishing out two assists under the basket, one to Lasme and one to Perkins, giving Maccabi some breathing room, 98 – 87.
A defensive rebound by Green turned into points for Maccabi by Perkins, then Perk added an assist of his own, bouncing the ball off the glass to Lasme for the dunk with a minute left in the game.
Limonad finished out the game from the free throw line and Maccabi Electra Tel Aviv notched up another Israeli League win, 104 – 87 over Hapoel Holon.

Box Scores

Maccabi: Bluthenthal 16 points; Wisniewski 13 points, 7 assists; Lasme 13 points, 5 rebounds; Pnini 12 points, 5 rebounds; Eidson 9 points; Perkins and Sharp 8 points each; Fischer 7 points; Limonad 6 points; Green 6 points; Anderson 6 points, 6 assists.

Holon: Thomas 19 points; Kelly 17 points; Bratic 14 points; Ivory 11 points; Graves 8 points; Mitchell 6 points; Berkowitz 5 points; Nir 4 points; Lipshits 3 points.

“I can say now that there’s no more need to talk; the players know the position they’re in,” said Maccabi head coach Pini Gershon after the win against Holon and especially before the first game of the Euroleague quarterfinals.
“We saw it in practice yesterday, which was even more serious than the game tonight.
There’s no need to talk to them about motivation and how important the game is.”

“We took Holon as a model before the game against Partizan,” added the coach, “and tried to use Thomas and his size as preparation, but it really wasn’t close enough.
We don’t have a perfect match-up against Partizan on defense; we’ll need to deal with that in our own way.
In other words, we’ll need to be creative.
There were times tonight that it looked like we were playing dodge ball; the ball was flying from side to side.”

“Now we can concentrate on Partizan; up until now we haven’t even talked about them,” said Doron Perkins.
“This was a tough game, and you’ve got to give credit to Holon.
All of the teams that started the season in Europe hope to make it to the Final Four, and now we’ve got a great opportunity to do it.”

Yaniv Green added, “We were a lot better than we were against Afula.
Holon is a strong team and is a bit similar to Partizan.
We hope we’ll be better against Partizan.
Everyone else started talking about Partizan even before the game against Holon was over.
Now we can turn our attention to them; Partizan is a great team and we’ll do the maximum to beat them.”

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