Hapoel Gilboa/Galil finally claimed its first victory of the BSL season on
Monday night, surprising in-form Barak Netanya 83-74 on the road.
Gilboa
entered the game as one of the league’s biggest disappointments after beginning
the season with a 0-6 record, while Netanya has been the BSL’s surprise package,
winning five of its first six games.
However, Gilboa outscored Netanya
30-16 in the second quarter on Monday and remained in control until the final
buzzer to finally get its campaign rolling.
Mitchell Watt led Gilboa with
21 points and 10 rebounds, with Jamar Smith adding 20 points, six assists and
five rebounds.
Deron Washington had 22 points and eight boards for
Netanya, which led 18-17 after 10 minutes.
However, Gilboa went on an
11-0 second-quarter run to seize control (30-25) and led by double digits for
almost all of the second half after taking a 47-34 gap into the
break.
Also Monday, Maccabi Rishon Lezion snapped a two-game losing
streak and improved to 4-2, beating Bnei Herzliya 91-76.
The final score
didn’t really do Rishon’s dominance justice, with the visitors beginning the
game with a 14-2 run and all but clinching the win by halftime, opening a 54-28
lead.
Julian Wright led Rishon with 20 points and 10 rebounds, while
Adrian Uter scored 18 and Lazeric Jones added 16.
Romel Beck had 25
points for Herzliya, which dropped to 2-4, losing its third straight
game.
“We steamrolled them in the first half,” said Rishon’s pleased
coach Effi Birenboim. “We implemented everything we worked on during the
week.
However, as a coach I do need to find a solution for what happened
to us in the second half.
“We still have some issues to fix. But most of
all we need to be patient.”
Maccabi Ashdod’s game against Maccabi Haifa
was postponed to Wednesday due to last week’s rocket fire from Gaza.