Photo credit: Lior Ben Shai – Hapoel Tel Aviv
With the end of the great season in the Youth Premier League and shortly before the young Israeli teams go to the European Championships, the Sports Channel’s website launched the “Future Generation” project, where we will tell you about some of the youngest and most talented players in Israel today. After we started with Kochav Gilboa / Ma’ainot, Niv Lampert, it’s time for another young talent – Eli DolinskyA player of the youth team of Hapoel Tel Aviv, who grew up in the club.
Dolinsky, forward / center 2.04 m tall, is currently finishing 11th grade, which means another season awaits him in his youth. To tell the story of Dolinsky’s ascent this season we’ll start with what he told about it Eran Gamzo, His coach and the professional director of the youth department of Hapoel Tel Aviv. “He started the year with us as a bench player, not a leading player. He looked unprepared, immature, we thought maybe give him minutes in the second team to gain mileage but in the end we went for it and he started with us. At first he barely saw 5-10 minutes in the game “.
So why are we actually telling you about a bench player who gets 5-10 minutes per game as the next star? Note Dolinsky’s numbers in the playoffs and in the Youth Premier League final series, in which his team eventually lost 2: 1 to Gilboa / Maayanot:
Averages per game in the final (3 games): 27 points, 8 rebounds, 2 blocks, 50% for three (9/18), and 89% from the line (25/28) in 35.5 minutes.
Playoff averages (8 games): 22.6 points, 8.7 rebounds, 1.5 blocks, 55% for three (21/38) and 80% from the line (38/48) in 32.3 minutes.
As you probably understand, last season Dolinsky became a young and talented player but not due to be the biggest star of the red youth team, being a year younger, and even more, than almost all his teammates (in most of the finals on the field there were 9 players from Mib and one Dolinsky). So what was the process that went through the high and what are the qualities that make him such a special player? The answers are here.
“What Gil Salter (assistant coach and who has coached Dolinsky in recent years) and I tried to do with him was build him from character,” Gimzo says. “We knew he was very talented and we wanted to put the talent aside and do the actions he was less good at like rebounds and defense. We did not give up on him for a moment on these things, and he often sat on the sidelines until he clung to it. “The first ones prepared him mentally. As soon as it connected, towards the middle of the year, he was already an above-level player.”
Last summer, the forward / center was part of the cadet team that participated in the Challenger tournament, where he averaged 7.2 points and 7.4 rebounds in 18.8 minutes. Our coach Barak Demitsian He said: “I have known him for several years, at the age of 13 he was very tall but had difficulty with simple actions, like running even. We worked hard with him physically and here comes the credit to fitness coach Yuval Tevet, who helped him a lot in development.”
Demitsian recalled: “What stood out about Eli was that he was always with the ball in hand, he was mentally ill with the game. He became a scorer who could score points in a variety of ways. Outside shooting, post-up, offensive rebound. He made tremendous progress and today we see That with his break-in. “
When looking at Dolinsky’s many offensive qualities, there is one thing that sets him apart from many tall players, including basketball players. As you can see in the video below, when Dolinsky gets a ball on the arc of the three, he almost never uses the “dip” action, in which the player drops the ball during the catch and only then raises it back and throws. Given that it scores in very high percentages (as you have seen before) and is 2.04 high, this technique becomes a deadly weapon on any scale.
“Even before the talent, his best qualities are that he is very strong in the head and very humble, always lowering his head and smiling, never talking about himself,” Gimzo says. “From there, with the talent it becomes very easy. He knows what’s good for him and he has a backbone. When you take all these things then it’s very easy to prepare him for big games because he believes in himself and knows what he needs to do, he’s not stressed.”
When trying to figure out what things he will need to improve Dolinsky in his final high school year and further down the road to becoming a complete player, the most notable thing is the matter of position. This year the high ranges from 4 to 5 positions and Gamzo also knows that a player of size like his will have a hard time playing about 5 in the seniors. “His next step as a player is to play in position 3 as well, so that he can play in some positions in the seniors. From next year we will play with him in that position as much as possible, that’s the next step.”
“Right now the downside is that he is still between the positions,” says Gimzo, “but once he knows how to combine playing with the face to the basket and back to the basket, and manages to produce simple and good movements without rioting, he will grow. “Defensively, we demanded that he keep guards and press the ball so that he could maintain several positions.”
Gamzo concluded: “We want him to be a stretcher (a player in position four who can” stretch “the opponent’s defense with the help of the shot), so that he will be a player at the highest levels, not only in Israel but also in Europe.” Demitsian strengthened: “He will go far, his character will make him work day and night to be successful. The talent he has is not high – shooting from the outside, lowering a ball to the floor. He will improve more elements and go very far.”
Watch a variety of Dolinsky moves in the final series >>>