{"id":757330,"date":"2026-06-10T08:36:20","date_gmt":"2026-06-10T08:36:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/757330\/"},"modified":"2026-06-10T08:36:20","modified_gmt":"2026-06-10T08:36:20","slug":"israeli-basketball-controversy-continues-hapoel-tel-aviv-barely-beat-jerusalem","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/757330\/","title":{"rendered":"Israeli basketball controversy continues, Hapoel Tel Aviv barely beat Jerusalem"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Israel Basketball<\/a> Association Court ruled that the entire semifinal game 1 between Hapoel Tel Aviv and Hapoel Jerusalem should be replayed, following the controversial early finish on Sunday evening.<\/p>\n

Semifinal game 1 was cut short by the Iranian attack and change in Home Front Comand guidelines. Although the game was allowed to continue after fans had been evacuated, the Jerusalem team chose not to return to the pitch and finish the match.<\/p>\n

As a result, it was initially recommended by both the Israel Basketball League Administration and the Israel Basketball Association\u2019s prosecutor that a technical win should be issued to Hapoel Tel Aviv.<\/p>\n

The court ultimately decided to replay<\/a> the full game to the delight of the Jerusalem faithfuls, who had seen their team in a 77-67 hole after 30 minutes in the opening contest of the series.<\/p>\n

The prosecutor, along with the Israel Basketball League Administration as well as Hapoel Tel Aviv, appealed to the high court in order to overturn the ruling.<\/p>\n

\"HapoelHapoel Jerusalem owner Matan Adelson speaks with reporters about the handling of the halted Game 1 of the series. (credit: YEHUDA HALICKMAN)<\/p>\n

Hapoel Jerusalem Owner Matan Adelson spoke about the decision to replay Game 1 as well as a number of other issues surrounding the club.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel good. I\u2019m pleased with the decision that they\u2019ve made. Obviously with Game 1, the circumstances were very extraordinary and out of the ordinary and there\u2019s no rule. The founding fathers of Israeli basketball, so to speak, never thought of a situation where a game could be interrupted by missiles or by change in Home Front Command restrictions and we felt that it wasn\u2019t appropriate to go and continue the game. We stood behind our players in the sense that they were uncomfortable and we pushed, originally, to replay the fourth quarter or to replay the entire game and this is the outcome. So we\u2019re very pleased and we\u2019re going to continue to fight all the way.\u201d<\/p>\n

Is the league picking sides?<\/p>\n

Adelson also expressed his dissatisfaction and disappointment in how the league is handling the case arguing that they were essentially throwing Hapoel Jerusalem under the bus.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe league, the way it\u2019s set up, delegates certain powers to certain entities and in this circumstance it delegates the power to take discretion or decisions on these issues to the Israel Basketball Association court. It needs to stand behind these issues and it\u2019s very clear that the league took a side and is now very disappointed, and it really needs to stand behind the decisions that the internal stakeholders have taken\u2026 It\u2019s very disappointing.\u201d<\/p>\n

The chairman of the league, Ari Steinberg, who is usually involved in controversial matters, has been fairly quiet and hasn\u2019t been in touch with Adelson.<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t heard from him personally. I know that the league put out a letter and I believe he was signed on that letter. So that\u2019s Ari speaking publicly, then so be it. But no, I mean, I\u2019m not surprised.\u201d<\/p>\n

There had been plenty of criticism levied at Jerusalem, as well as at Adelson, for not wanting to continue playing Game 1 and now the club is continuing to play the series with just four import players as others left the country because of the situation.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve put immense effort in the last 48 hours to keep the team together and from one side, I\u2019m very disappointed, but from the other side, as someone that didn\u2019t grow up here, I understand them because what\u2019s going on in this country is not normal.”<\/p>\n

“I love this country to death. I grew up in the United States. I choose to be here. I\u2019m a Zionist. I love this country. I love our people, but not everyone feels the same way, and as someone who\u2019s not Jewish, speaking about them, someone whose parents and his family are not Israeli, from one side, I don\u2019t judge them at all and I understand,” he continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut from the other side, I\u2019m definitely disappointed, because my role as the owner of the organization, as the owner of the team, is to fill the most competitive roster and to go all the way and do everything we can to achieve our goals, which is to win titles. So, I\u2019m definitely disappointed that these guys have left. I understand, but they\u2019re not here and I really appreciate the guys that have decided to stay and that will continue to fight and give everything on the court and we\u2019ll go with them and we\u2019re going to go all the way with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

The results of semifinal game 2<\/p>\n

There was still a second basketball game<\/a> to be played and Hapoel Tel Aviv defeated Hapoel Jerusalem 88-84 with Vasilije Micic hitting the game-winning three-pointer to give the visitors the Game 2 victory at the Pais Arena in the capital city.<\/p>\n

Jerusalem got off to a hot start as Khadeen Carrington, Justin Smith and Cassius Winston all scored, but Yam Madar hit his shots from deep while Ish Wainright and Chris Jones all scored to help the visitors to a 43-40 lead at halftime.<\/p>\n

Madar, Wainright and Micic continued to fill the basket as Jared Harper, Winston and Carrington kept the game close. However, Micic\u2019s 3-pointer as time wound down handed Hapoel Tel Aviv the lead for good as they closed out the tight win.
While it\u2019s still unclear what the outcome of the court appeals will be, Game 3<\/a> (and possibly Game 1 as well) of the best-of-five series is slated for Thursday night at Yad Eliyahu.<\/p>\n

Madar scored 25 points to lead Tel Aviv in Game 2, Wainright added 21 points, Jones scored 15 points and Micic dropped 14 points in the victory while Carrington scored 16 points, Winston put in 13 points and Smith scored 12 points for Jerusalem in the loss.<\/p>\n

What did the teams think of the game?<\/p>\n

Discussing their victory Tel Aviv coach Dimitrios Itoudis said, \u201cIt was an amazing second win for us, we had a slow start but I trusted the team would come back and we did… as far as I see it we are ahead 2-0 as we were there and the other team didn\u2019t show up [for the fourth quarter of Game 1]. For us it\u2019s obviously 2-0.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cGreat players make great plays and we saw that with the late three-pointer by Vasilije Micic, but games like this can go either way and it went theirs,” reflected Jerusalem coach Yonatan Alon, “There are a lot of thoughts and opinions as to what should have happened but it\u2019s been a long ride this entire season.”<\/p>\n

Wainright explained, \u201cWe came out and punched back after a slow start, we finished the game strong and after the game we spoke about what we have to do better next game as it\u2019s a war. Credit goes to the teammates and fans that showed up, it\u2019s a war and my job is to do whatever I can. As for Vasa\u2019s three-pointer, we all know he can make shots like that, he\u2019s done so his entire career, and we are excited to see him hit that shot.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s rough and we wanted to win this game and that was the goal going into it. That was really important for me and also to put on a good show. We were there and we battled, we wanted to win, but it was those small details at the end of the game that was the difference. The last couple of days have been very difficult and I really have a ton of respect for the foreign players who stayed here. They really gave it all in this game,\u201d added Hapoel Jerusalem player, Eitan Burg<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Israel Basketball Association Court ruled that the entire semifinal game 1 between Hapoel Tel Aviv and Hapoel…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":757331,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3724],"tags":[7,30000,17776,92845,66],"class_list":["post-757330","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-hapoel-jerusalem","tag-hapoel-tel-aviv","tag-iran-israel-war","tag-sports"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116724903897202295","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757330","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=757330"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/757330\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/757331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=757330"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=757330"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=757330"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}