By: Owen Ebner (10th Grade)
For stir crazy high school athletes, this week was exciting as it kicked off with the beginning of the Hebrew Academy’s March Madness. The first games played this Monday were the White team against the Black team at 4:15 PM followed by the Grey team versus the Blue team at 5:00PM .
The Black team, led by Ben Rubinov, narrowly defeated White in a nailbiter. After trailing by as much as 11 points in the first half, they went on a fierce scoring run with Rapha Safdie scoring 12 points. Asher Miller hit a late three for White to bring them down 3 points, but there was only 3 seconds left and Black was able to just escape.
“We won because we played great together as a team. Even though we struggled a bit in the beginning, we bounced back,” said Black team member Yossi Shaulson (10th Grade). “We’re excited for the next one and this whole tournament.”
During the 5:00 PM slate, the Blue team defeated the Grey by 14 points. It was a close game in the first half, with both teams exchanging scores. Blue led by 5 with six minutes left, before they pulled away. Akiva Itzkowitz led Blue in scoring and helped secure the win.
“I think we played really well and proved we were the better team in the game. We put up some nice shots and got rebounds on offense and defense,” said Yonatan Mizrahi (10th), a player on the Blue team. “There are some things we can improve on. I think that we should take smarter shots and look for open teammates.”
Teams will get another chance to play again in the coming weeks. It will be very interesting to see how the season goes and we’ll be sure to report it here.
League Standings (Including Wednesday’s games):
Blue: 2-0
Grey: 1-1
Black: 1-1
White: 0-2