Striving for greatness: Hapoel Jerusalem looks ahead to busy off-season

While the 2023/24 basketball season just came to an end last week, Hapoel Jerusalem is already gearing up in earnest for the upcoming campaign.

The capital Reds, who are going to enter the second year under the ownership of Matan Adelson, are wasting no time as they look to continue to build upon a State Cup victory.

The first move for Jerusalem was to install Yonatan Alon as the permanent head coach after he moved down from the sporting director position in the front office to the sidelines when the club parted ways with Ilias Kantzouris. Next up was bringing in a new general manager as Dan Shamir was appointed after having been Bnei Herzliya’s bench boss last season. Shamir, who had coached Jerusalem between 2006-08, has a wealth of experience with stops at Milano and CSKA Moscow as an assistant under legendary coach Ettore Messina as well as having been in charge at the New Zealand Breakers between 2019-2022.

This coming season will mark Hapoel Jerusalem’s return to the EuroCup after six years in the Basketball Champions League as it will look to find a way to eventually play in the coveted Euroleague, while the club will also introduce a new digital platform for fans to manage their tickets among other things.

A new chapter

However, the club also has a number of challenges that it will have to face head on as it continues to strive for greatness.

“It’s an exciting new day, a new chapter in the era of the club under my tenure,” team owner Matan Adelson began. “I’m happy to announce Dan Shamir as sports director and Yonatan Alon, who had been in that position, is now stepping into the role of head coach.”

“Transparency always wins,” Adelson continued as he spoke about how the club decided to take off Alon’s interim tag. “We set criteria for the head coach and it was important to bring someone with those items. When we saw that we would have to compromise on some, we looked at what we had in hand and we saw very quickly that Yonatan Alon was the right person. He did a great job to end the season and he deserves this.”

Alon will enter his first full season on the bench after having served in various roles throughout his career and he is looking forward to the challenge.

“This was the right thing for the club and of course me taking this position is not something that is done against my will. I am happy with this position and the onus of proof will be on me.” However, Alon won’t be heading into the upcoming season with his captain Levi Randolph, who opted out of his contract to join a Euroleague team, which is expected to be Maccabi Tel Aviv. The Reds apparently did not limit his ability to sign with another club in the country which in the past had been a standard clause in the team’s contracts, and Adelson admitted that this was a mistake.

“As for Levi Randolph, while there has not been any official statement that has been made, losing Levi is a hit for our organization. Not only is he a man who is true to his values, he’s a strong leader and gave a lot to this club as a professional, as a player and as a person. I’m the first to admit and if he signs with Maccabi, it’s a hit. They won this round. We have to get up and punch back. I’m going to make mistakes every day but I can promise I won’t make the same mistake twice.”

Alon also spoke warmly about Randolph and what he had brought to the team.

“There are no thoughts of betrayal or anything like that. It’s a professional sport and every professional has to make the best decisions for his career and that doesn’t make me appreciate what Levi did for us any less. If he plays for Maccabi, I hope he will score 30 points and lose every game! He is an amazing guy, an amazing player, I want him to have an incredible life and that is how we treat our players who have left. We will embrace those players and if he does go to Maccabi we will compete against him on the court and show him that he made a bad decision.”

Hapoel  will move back to the EuroCup after more than half a decade away from the competition, which is regarded as the continent’s second best league after the Euroleague.

Unlike the Basketball Champions League, the EuroCup provides a slot to the winner of the league the opportunity to move up to the Euroleague and that is the goal of the club, explained Adelson, despite the rumors that the Eurocup and BCL will merge next season.

 “The merger was being discussed last year and that’s why we stayed in the Basketball Champions League. But after we saw that was not the correct decision, we moved to the EuroCup and we will try to get to the Euroleague and be better suited for that. That is our mission, to get to the Euroleague. That was not the right choice we made last year.

“We always want to win and we want to win every championship that we are competing in. As for our budget, it has increased each of the past couple of seasons. Statistically it’s not in our favor to win the EuroCup as we are one of 20 teams, but we will do everything in our favor to make it happen.”

Hapoel minority shareholder, consultant and former NBA player Gal Mekel is excited about what the future holds.

 “We are building the club no matter how many flights there will be,” Mekel added. “That is part of the process that we are going to go through as we will be a part of the EuroCup. We are very proud of our roster and the Israelis that we have that we have as we have built this squad looking forward many years ahead. Noam Dovrat, who is coming off an injury, is due to have a breakout year, Khadeen Carrington, Yovel Zoosman and Gaby Chachashvili will lead us in the coming years.”

Shamir will play a big part in finding players to fill out the Jerusalem squad and will need to look for not only the right matches but also battle a market that has been on the one hand hurt by the war, but on the other offers opportunity.

“I don’t think I have a special perspective on the player market, but it’s good for everyone to know that there are very significant things happening right now in our region that affect many people’s lives. I’m sure everyone feels this burden on their shoulders and it obviously has meaning in what we are dealing with. Bringing the right person to the right place is always challenging.”

“We are in an excellent situation despite what is happening and there is a situation here that is attractive to many players and I am sure that this will be reflected in building the squad. Everyone who lives here knows that professional sports are also particularly affected by what happens in Israel, but let’s put everything in proportion, many people are affected by it in a much more dramatic way. We need to discuss these things with the potential players, explain the situation, put together a quality team that plays in Europe – for us that is what is important right now. I see this as a big mission to bring in players who will leave with good experiences. It’s important and we’ll do our best to make it happen.”

As for the fans, the club’s CEO, Alon Kremer, spoke about how the Reds are unveiling a new era in the digitalization of tickets and other perks along with how they are setting up their season-ticket packages while also looking at various options as to where the club will play home European games should it not be able to play at the Pais Arena.

Hapoel Jerusalem is no doubt entering one of its busiest offseasons to date, with a lot of moving parts and changes that will potentially have an effect on the club for years to come. The Reds need to do so slowly but surely in order to ensure that they can put themselves in the best position to succeed.