Israeli Cup First Round December 8th
The original schedule for the two first round games was originally last Monday, but they were split up with the first on Thursday. Promise Amukamara led Herzliya to a 75-59 win over Hapoel Petah Tikva.
https://ibasketball.co.il/match/637749-%d7%94%d7%a4%d7%95%d7%a2%d7%9c-%d7%a4%d7%aa-%d7%91%d7%a0%d7%99-%d7%91%d7%a0%d7%99-%d7%94%d7%a8%d7%a6%d7%9c%d7%99%d7%94/
Hapoel Petah Tikva [59]: Purvis 19 Bell 15/13r Cowling 6/9r Bellock 6
Bnot Herzliya [75]: Amukamara 20 Richardson 16/12r Day 15/6r Zambrotta 10 Shea 6
Israeli League Round 7 December 12th
A big game started the round on Monday and Maccabi Ashdod is serious about domestic contention, bringing in another import strictly for that purpose while Shatori Walker-Kimbrough had a triple-double in their 70-68 win over Shakira Austin and Elitzur Ramla to stay undefeated and open up a two game lead in the standings. The next game had Adut Bulgak and Amy Okonkwo holding an advantage in the paint to lead Maccabi Haifa to an 81-73 win over Kenisha Bell, Kristi Bellock, and Hapoel Petah Tikva. Eden Zipel and Kaila Charles led a more balanced effort for Hapoel Rishon Lezion that helped cancel out Maya Caldwell’s incredible effort for Maccabi Ramat Gan that still had them losing 95-73. Two teams balancing continental competitions met with Alisia Jenkins leading Ramat Hasharon to an 84-71 win over Courtney Hurt, Alex Harden, and Elitzur Holon. ASA Jerusalem looks a lot more competitive with a full roster and they were led by Danielle Adams, but it was not enough as they fell short to Promise Amukamara, Breanna Richardson, and Herzliya.
http://wbl.co.il/game-zone.asp?GameId=4402
Maccabi Ashdod [70]: Hiedeman 17 Edelman 14/8r Walker-Kimbrough 11/19r/10a Brown 11 Sahar 6 Cohen 4/6r Dayan 0
Elitzur Ramla [68]: Austin 24/11r Baron 16 Mosby 13/10r Rotberg 12 Babkina 0 Fleischer 0 Danan 0
http://wbl.co.il/game-zone.asp?GameId=4399
Maccabi Haifa [81]: Bulgak 30/20r Okonkwo 28/12r Hopkins 4/9r/6a
Hapoel Petah Tikva [73]: Bell 26/11r Bellock 20/6r Hadad 10 Cowling 7/6r Purvis 5
http://wbl.co.il/game-zone.asp?GameId=4400
Hapoel Rishon Lezion [95]: Zipel 21 Charles 20/7r/9a Hooper 17/10r Karsh 14/6r Ettinger 11 Simon 10/11r
Maccabi Ramat Gan [73]: Caldwell 38/8r Alleyne 16/12r Brown 14/10a
http://wbl.co.il/game-zone.asp?GameId=4401
Elitzur Holon [71]: Hurt 32/10r Harden 21 Presley 7 Ivanovic 2
Ramat Hasharon [84]: Jenkins 24/9r Jones 17/8r Collier 14/9r Saar 13 Deluty 0
http://wbl.co.il/game-zone.asp?GameId=4398
Bnot Herzliya [78]: Amukamara 23 Richardson 22/13r Day 15/15r Zambrotta 7 Shea 2
ASA Jerusalem [73]: Adams 23/14r Wurtz 19/8r/6a Colley 15 Mihailetz 12
Standings:
1. Maccabi Ashdod 7-0
2. Elitzur Ramla 5-2
3. Maccabi Ramat Gan 5-2
4. Maccabi Haifa 4-3
5. Hapoel Rishon Lezion 3-4
6. Ramat Hasharon 3-4
7. Bnot Herzliya 3-4
8. Hapoel Petah Tikva 2-5
9. Elitzur Holon 2-5
10. ASA Jerusalem 1-6
World of Basketball
Americas
The playoffs continued in Puerto Rico on Tuesday and Manati look the lead against Carolina with an 87-66 win. On Wednesday, Santurce avoided elimination again with Stephanie Watts leading them in an 89-84 win over Moca. The other series also needed a deciding game after Sabrina Haines led Carolina to a 75-72 win over Manati. The first Game 5 was on Friday and Ariana Moorer was tremendous for Santurce, but Moca leaned on its starters, playing four of them for the entire game and only giving the other one 3:05 to rest and that combination was enough to come back late for a 74-71 win. Carolina prevailed 75-61 on Saturday to eliminate the top seed Manati.
Javiera Novion continued to show that she is the most complete player in Chile’s league as she had 41 points in a big win. Tatiana Gomez has also had a good season, but could not keep up with the scoring in their matchup even though she had 20 rebounds. Josefina Cortes had two 21 rebound games while Anahi Moran had a 32 point effort. In Argentina, the regular season will pause for a month for the holidays after the last game was played on Monday. There will be the first winner decided in playoffs based on the first half of the season standings. Obras from the South Conference will play Montmartre from the North Conference in one semifinal while Pacifico from the South Conference will play Quimsa from the North Conference.
Asia
A new week in South Korea started with first versus worst on Wednesday, but it was actually relatively close before Woori Bank won 73-62 over Hana Bank. The S-Birds won 81-67 over BNK on Thursday. The Blue Minx took advantage of that on Friday to jump into second place with a 66-54 over the Stars. Woori Bank won again on Saturday 79-62 over the S-Birds. Sunday’s game was a 69-47 BNK win over Hana Bank. Monday’s game was not a vintage one, but Woori Bank still has a big lead in the standings after a 51-39 over the Stars.
The regular season continued in Japan for the first time in over a month and the Iris remain undefeated after another sweep. The season also continued in Kazakhstan at a single site. After completing a round-robin a month before, the ten teams were split into halves for this stage based on those results to play four games in this phase between Sunday and Friday. Barsy Atyrau is still their looking for their first win after two more losses, but you certainly cannot blame Shugyla Kemel after she scored 34 points on Monday. Nadezhda Yakovleva grabbed 21 rebounds against them on Sunday. Turan continues to lead the top half after winning their first game in this stage, but the top individual performances came from Tomiris as Elizaveta Mitina had 32 points and Aleksandra Varaksina had 20 rebounds.
European Cross-National Competitions
Another round of games was played in the combined Albania-Kosovo competition. Taliyah Hopkins had 33 points for Bashkimi, but they were still edged out 77-76 by Penza. In Kosovo’s domestic league, Aulona Muhadri grabbed 28 rebounds in a game while Ireyon Keith had 32 points. Albania’s league has completed a round-robin and Samra Omerbasic had 37 points to lead Flamutari to a win to keep their perfect record. Barleti is still winless after Enisa Qosja had 30 points in a win for Tirana. Buducnost is still the only undefeated team in the Adriatic as some teams are about to play their last games in this phase. The last two undefeated teams in the Baltic league faced off on Saturday and Riga Stradins University defeated Neptunas 80-66. Audentes is still winless after Tyra Buss had 34 points in an Aistes victory. There were also big individual games in Lithuania’s domestic competition as Kristina Grige grabbed 22 rebounds while Rita Zilinskaite had 33 points. Over in Latvia’s domestic competition, Annija Zvirgzdina had a triple-double. Riga hosted the latest set of games in the European League over the weekend. Polonia Warszawa defeated Ostrava 76-60 and the hosts won 76-68 against Chomutov on Saturday. The two Czech teams started Sunday’s action and Anacia Wilkinson led Ostrava to a 74-69 win over Chomutov and then Polonia Warszawa defeated the hosts 74-70 to stay undefeated.
The Chase for Promotion
39 points from Sasha Goodlett was not enough for Tarsus to avoid losing to Izmit, but they still have a two game lead on the non-reserve sides in Turkey’s second division. Ferrol now has a two game lead in the loss column in Spain’s second division. In the third division, Castello was able to take advantage of the two teams behind them facing each other to open up a two game lead in Group B. Topolcanka has a two game lead in Serbia’s second division while Jelena Lazarevic had 33 points in a win against the last winless team Stara Pazova. Rakia Lane had 31 points in Portugal’s second division, but the performance of the week went to Becca Wann-Taylor again with a 36 point, 26 rebound effort. Italy’s second division is closer to having all the teams on equal footing as the northern section reached that this weekend with Scrivia and Milano still undefeated. In the southern section, a wild makeup game went to two overtime before Antonia Peresson and Empoli could prevail 107-103 over Allegra Botteghi and Patti. Deborah Gonzalez had a 33 point game over the weekend. Keylyn Filewich had 30 points in a win for Bochum, the leaders in Germany’s second division’s northern half. Wurzburg continues to lead in the south while Wasserburg’s struggles continue at the bottom.
As usual, there were some big games in Iceland’s second division. 41 points from Violet Morrow was not enough for KR as Dilja Larusdottir had 31 points and Stjarnan stayed undefeated with an 86-83 win. Cheah Rael-Whitsett had 24 rebounds as Snaefell won to stay behind them in the standings. Madison Sutton had a 33 point, 18 rebound effort.
Notable Individual Performances
It was a cup weekend in Switzerland with two second division teams looking to advance with the six top division teams also involved. Winterthur did not have much of a chance against the top division’s powerhouse team Fribourg and two good efforts definitely was not enough with Cori Coleman and Cinzia Tomezzoli scoring all 59 of the team’s points between them. Saturday was the day for cup quarterfinals in Finland and Ilmar’I Thomas had 37 points in Torpan Pojat’s win in the first game. Tera Reed had 31 points to get Tampereen Pyrinto a win. Tynice Martin had 39 points in Vimpelin Veto’s win that closed out the day.
In Sweden, Klara Lundquist had a 32 point, 13 rebound, 15 assist game as she approaches the scoring lead held by Aquira DeCosta, who did increase her rebounding average by grabbing 22 of them. Oceana Hamilton grabbed 20 rebounds in a loss. In Romania, Rodjanae Wade grabbed 21 rebounds while Keilanei Cooper had 31 points. Rosinha Rosario was the leading scorer in Portugal this week with a 33 point effort. One game in Luxembourg had plenty of strong individual efforts as Frankie Wurtz had 30 points in the win while Jaiamoni Welch-Coleman had 39 points and Isis Lane had 20 rebounds in the loss. The leading scorer over the weekend was Mikayla Ferenz, who had 41 points. In Iceland, Tinna Alexandersdottir had 30 points while her teammate Keira Robinson recorded a triple-double. Hannah Little had 31 points for Freiburg in Germany. Hailey Leidel was the leading scorer in Cyprus again with a 34 point game. Emilija Podrug had a triple-double in Croatia. In the Bosnian league, Niya Mitchell had 46 points to lead her team to victory while Almedina Ahmic had a 20 rebound game. Carlie Littlefield had a 31 point game in Belgium. The first round-robin concluded in Armenia with Nyra Williams recording a triple-double and Narine Gyokchyan and Lillian Brown each grabbing 21 rebounds in one game while E’moni Washington had 30 points in the other. Toshua Leavitt had a 32 point game in the Netherlands.
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