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In a story that has captivated the world, Robert M. Beren Academy in Houston’s Rabbi, Avi Pollack joined The Sports Rabbi to breakdown what went on in the Orthodox day school and the basketball world this past week.
By making the statement that Shabbat & G-d are more important than a basketball game, the Beren Academy made worldwide headlines by deciding to withdraw from the Texas Association of Private and Parochial Schools, TAPPS tournament when their semi-finals and finals matches were scheduled for Friday night and Saturday afternoon.
The story which was covered by the New York Times and ESPN ended happily in the fact that TAPPS finally acquiesced and changed the times of the games which allowed Beren Academy to make to the finals where they eventually lost. Join me for this great interview where Rabbi Avi Pollak explains the school’s stance and how a great sanctification of G-d’s name was made!
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Next on tap was Ornit Schwartz (21:39) who graced The Sports Rabbi Radio Network airwaves and talked about her fabulous career as one of Israel’s finest female basketball players! Ornit played for many teams in the Israeli league and returned this past season after winning the treble-3 championships, one of which was the ULEB European Cup for Elitzur Ramle.
Ornit retired following the season and is now working with the youth of Ramle encouraging participation in sports which gives one a healthy outlook and a healthy life. Ornit is so enthusiastic about her work and I encourage all of you to be in touch with Ornit via Facebook and see how you can help her as well!
Alex Tyus (52:00) of Maccabi Ashdod Basketball joined The Sports Rabbi next as we discussed his 1st year in the Israeli league after coming to the Holy Land from the University of Florida where he was a standout player. We talked about how he has adjusted to his life here in Israel and we also bring up the subject of the Israel National Team as a possibility for Alex down the road.
Of course Jon Scheiman (1:02:46) of True Hoops NY broke down the lastest in the NBA as we focused on Rajon Rondo and Deron Williams fantastic games this past week in his most recent post “Performance Pick’em”.
We also talk about the great point guards, including Chris Paul and Derrick Rose along with analyzing Kobe Bryant’s man on a mission match against the Miami Heat LeBron James and Dwayne Wade.
Allon Sinai (1:32:34) of The Jerusalem Post and Jpost.com joined me to talk about the huge derby match this past Monday between Maccabi and Hapoel Tel Aviv. Unfortunately, the heated battle on the pitch where Maccabi (1-0) finally after 4 years won a match against Hapoel, was nothing compared to the battle off the pitch.
We saw flares being thrown by Hapoel fans into the Maccabi stands and injuring a young woman. We saw Hapoel fans throwing almost everything including the kitchen sink at the referees and security personnel. We saw 2 Hapoel players after being ejected run back onto the field to attack the referee when the final whistle sounded. And we saw a fan jump on the field wanting to let referee Menashe Mashiach know exactly how she felt about his calls. Not what you wanted to see at a soccer game in Israel, and we break it all down.
In addtion, Allon has a wonderful new piece at Jpost.com about Ali Khatib entitled, “Rising star causes Palestinian-Israeli soccer conflict”. So make sure to check Allon out!
To close out the show, Doc Ike (1:53:08) took a look at the big stories in the NHL this week. Of course the biggest is Sidney Crosby being cleared for contact and Randy Carlyle taking over the coaching reins from Ron Wilson in Toronto.