According to the basketball cliche, Maccabi Tel Aviv never loses twice in one week. But, three days before the decisive third game of the EuroLeague series against Barcelona, Zvika Sherf will need some convincing that this remains true - since his current Maccabi Tel Aviv has already proven it is capable of smashing every law of nature and every accepted rule relating to the team.
The main reason for this is that the current batch of players cannot withstand the pressure. Maccabi has a deep and talented roster, with a decent combination of experience and youth, a coach with years under his belt on the sidelines and a managerial team that makes sure everything runs like clockwork off the court - but the whole does not add up to the sum of its parts.
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Throughout the current season, Maccabi has proved it can make life difficult for itself even when it should be cruising effortlessly to victory. It often loses control of the situation, primarily because of a lack of leadership in its back line. (Incidentally, these moments of truth are not necessarily in the final second of a game, when Will Bynum and Yotam Halperin have developed a nasty habit of giving the ball away; they can come in the middle of game, when a momentary lapse of concentration in defense allows an opposing team to develop momentum with rapid-fire three-pointers, which allow them to turn the game around.)
None of this, of course, should detract from the accomplishment of Bnei Hasharon, which, on Sunday night, beat Maccabi Tel Aviv for the third time this season and climbed into first place in the standings. As the season has progressed, Bnei Hasharon has transformed itself from a limited team that happens to have Meir Tapiro in its ranks, to a serious challenger for the league title. Every time Maccabi Tel Aviv believes it has found the right path, along comes Effi Birenboim and holds up a mirror to the perennial champion's face. Maccabi may have a deep roster, but Sherf's problems are no less profound. Croatian center Nikola Vujcic is unable to control the game whenever he is faced with an athletic and powerful front line; the fight Omri Casspi (sic) puts up and Terence Morris' presence are not always enough; Vonteego Cummings is another negligible bench player; Esteban Batista is unaware of his place in the current offensive hierarchy; Lior Eliyahu is a shadow of his former self; even Derrick Sharp's hand has started to shake in money time. The lack of confidence is plain for all to see and, under these circumstances, Sherf's efforts to play with a relatively short team and a zonal defense are destined to fail. What other outcome could there be when the players are weak at the knees?
So after Maccabi has proven for the umpteenth time that it doesn't know how to withstand pressure, the ball is back in its opponents' court. The three victories Bnei Hasharon has recorded over Maccabi this season have lifted it into top spot and turned it into the frontrunner for the pennant. Now it will be interesting to see how Effi and his players bear up under the weight of expectation.
Maccabi is lacking the power and destructiveness needed to win games, so its accomplishments from now on - in the Israeli league and the EuroLeague - are very much dependent on its opponents' coolness under pressure - and not just on its own players. This current Maccabi team is clearly not the champion David Feldman and Shimon Mizrahi had been hoping for. But if we cast our minds back to how the season began, it would be fair to say that they, too, were unable to stand the pressure.
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