Basketball / Fortunes reverse for Israeli men and women

A week after Israel's men were upset by Italy while its women upended Latvia, the two national teams flipped their games. While the men cruised to a 92-56 blowout of Latvia, the women struggled against host Serbia, losing its lead in the final quarter and falling 70-68.

In Latvia, Israel quickly found itself down 13-5 but proceeded to go on a 13-2 run as part of a 49-13 tear to assert its authority and put the game out of reach before the end of the first half. Five Israelis reached double figures, while all nine scorers had at least seven points in one of the team's most balanced attacks to date.

	MISMATCH: Latvia’s Darius Bertans and Andrejs Selakovs, left, trying to stop Guy Pnini driving to the basket yesterday.
	Photo by: AP

"There's no such thing as a second team, everyone's equal," said Israeli head coach Arik Shivek after the game. "Is [David] Bluthenthal (12 points, six rebounds ) any worse than somebody on the starting five?" We've won games where Omri Casspi and Lior Eliyahu were good, and we've one when other players stood out." Indeed, Casspi had a mediocre evening yesterday while Eliyahu only woke up in the final period.

After building a 30-point lead, Israel softened a bit in the third quarter, allowing Latvia to draw within 77-54 with four minutes left in the third quarter. "I told the players during the last time out that we advanced in the last campaign by a one-basket difference, so every point is important," said Shivek.

The team responded by pushing the lead back over 30 points before the final whistle. Two minutes after that time out, Tal Burstein swarmed over Ronalds Zakis and fouled him. The Latvian forward said to him, "C'mon, you're leading by 30 points. Leave me alone." Burstein, the captain, hugged him apparently and responded that he doesn't yield easy baskets.

Guy Pniny led Israel with 14 points. Yuval Naimy, who added 11 points and dished out four assists, took charge during Israel's 36-11 second-quarter whipping. The team shot a sizzling 60.9 percent from two-point range and dominated the boards 44 to 25.

Unfortunately for the men, Italy edged Finland last night 85-83 to hold a one point lead in the standings, though Israel still has a game in hand. Both teams face first-place Montenegro, while Israel plays Finland this week.

They'll have to wait

It was to be expected that Serbia, a good team regardless, would fight Israel hard when playing before its own fans. Still, the 70-68 loss stung Israel and means it will have to wait for Thursday to try to secure its spot in the EuroBasket finals.

Although Liron Cohen, who lead the team with 19 points, and Shay Doron - who scored the team's first six points en route to an 18-point night, were their usual dominant selves, the rest of the team struggled to find its footing. Ekaterina Abramzon did score 13 points but was totally outplayed under the basket, grabbing just one rebound and allowing Serbia to score a pair of second-chance baskets down the crucial fourth-quarter stretch when the hosts ran up the score to 70-63 with 18 seconds left.

Israel's last lead came just before the end of the third quarter, when Cohen drained a three pointer to give the team a 53-51 margin. However, Serbia jumped out with a 10-1 run before Laine Selwyn made a free throw followed by four straight points by Abramzon to cut the lead to 61-59. Serbia used a couple of offensive rebounds to then rebuild its margin before Israel made a final, futile charge with a couple of steals and fast break attempts, but even then it wasted time, missing a couple of layups, and time expired on Israel.