Hapoel Holon hosts Strasbourg tonight (Wednesday) to open the quarter-final series of the playoffs in the FIBA Champions League. Guy Goodes’ team is the first Israeli in three years to compete in a playoff series in one of the three top European establishments with a home advantage and hope not to stumble before game number 2. In France, the Purples have the best home balance this season in the factory – 1: 7.
On the other hand, Strasbourg reaches the quarterfinals with an impressive 2: 5 balance in the away games. This is one of the quality offensive teams in the factory, but the plans went wrong for her along the way: John Roberson, her leading scorer in Europe with 17.1 points, injured and unfit; Jarl Eddie, the scorer who arrived this summer from Fenerbahce, moved to San Pablo Burgos – and was replaced by Cameron Taylor, who started the season at Maccabi Tel Aviv and was loaned to France.
the progress of the game
Quarter 1:
The host opened great as Chris Johnson hit two threes in the opening. On the defensive side, Guy Goodes’ players showed an aggressive defense that made it very difficult for the French, on the way to a first double-digit advantage – 6:16. Adam Smith showed good ability and reached double digits in points already in the first quarter. The lack of concentration of the Purples at the end of the first quarter helped the visitors go down towards the second quarter behind 25:19 only.
Quarter 2: