{"id":229982,"date":"2026-07-31T02:12:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-31T02:12:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/229982\/"},"modified":"2026-07-31T02:12:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-31T02:12:08","slug":"israel-u18-hoops-falls-to-slovenia-in-euro-quarters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/229982\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel U18 hoops falls to Slovenia in Euro quarters"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Israel\u2019s impressive unbeaten run at the FIBA Under-18 <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/tags\/europe\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">European<\/a> Championship came to an end on Thursday as the blue-and-white squad fell 95-87 to Slovenia in the quarterfinals, ending its hopes of competing for the continental title.<\/p>\n<p>Despite the defeat, coach Nadav Zilberstein\u2019s team still has plenty to play for, as it will now battle for fifth place, with a win in its next game securing a berth at next year\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/israel-news\/sports\/article-898932\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">FIBA<\/a> U19 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p>Israel entered the knockout clash full of confidence after a strong tournament and an emphatic win over <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/international\/article-901772\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Denmark<\/a>, but Slovenia proved to be its toughest test yet. The Slovenians were led by standout forward Stefan Joksimovic, who dominated with 28 points and 10 rebounds while helping his team control the glass, finishing with a commanding 50-38 rebounding advantage.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Israel made an encouraging start behind another outstanding performance from David Moses, who scored 24 points, while Aviv Aronov added 20 as the two offensive stars continued the form that had carried the team throughout the tournament.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">The Israelis held a narrow lead after the opening quarter before Slovenia rallied to take a 49-44 advantage into halftime.<\/p>\n<p>Zilberstein\u2019s players showed the resilience that has defined their tournament, erasing the deficit in the second half and briefly reclaiming the lead at 78-77 early in the fourth quarter. However, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.jpost.com\/israel-news\/politics-and-diplomacy\/article-900746\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Slovenia<\/a> responded with a decisive run, capitalizing on its rebounding edge and timely shooting to pull away in the closing minutes.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Although the quarterfinal loss ended Israel\u2019s medal aspirations, the tournament has highlighted the promise of another talented generation. Moses has averaged 23.8 points and 12.2 rebounds per game, while Aronov has led the championship in scoring at 24.4 points per contest.<\/p>\n<p class=\"article-paragraph-section article-body-paragraph\">Israel will now shift its focus to the classification games, knowing that one more victory could earn the nation a coveted place at next summer\u2019s FIBA U19 World Cup.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israel\u2019s impressive unbeaten run at the FIBA Under-18 European Championship came to an end on Thursday as the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":229983,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[33],"tags":[1522,8395,54,37,8178,12494],"class_list":["post-229982","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-israel","tag-basketball","tag-denmark","tag-europe","tag-israel","tag-israel-sports","tag-slovenia"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@iran\/117012171508486859","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229982","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=229982"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/229982\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/229983"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=229982"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=229982"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/iran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=229982"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}