By Eurohoops team/ info@eurohoops.net
Tarik Black scored a team-high 17 points and grabbed eight rebounds for a game-high-tying 23 PIR, as Maccabi Tel Aviv defeated Darussafaka Tekfen 77 – 58 at home.
Alex Tyus added 10 points and a game-high nine rebounds for 23 PIR as well while Michael Roll contributed 12 points to help Maccabi improve to 11 – 13 and remain deep in the playoff conversation.
As winning coach Giannis Sfairopoulos said: “I want to congratulate our players for the emphatic win. We controlled the game from our great defense, we allowed our opponents to score 23 points in the first half and a total of 58. I think that with our good defense from the beginning till the end we built up a point difference that gave us an easy win in the end.”
Bottom-placed Darussafaka dropped to 3-21. Jeremy Evans (17 points) and Oguz Savas (10 points, six rebounds) stood out from the Turkish side that trailed for the entirety of the game and never managed to actually be competitive.
Maccabi got a 16-point lead near the end of the first half, making it 34 – 18 thanks to an 8-0 run. Despite poor perimeter shooting (5/29), the hosts outplayed their opponents enough to always preserve a lead above 12 points. In the mid of the fourth period, that advantage was catapulted to 24, 51 – 27, with Maccabi, pretty much sealing the win.