In front of 10,000 yellow-clad fans, one of the favorites for this season, Maccabi Tel Aviv, opened its Euroleague campaign on Thursday with an 82-70 win over visiting Alba Berlin. Maccabi showed that they have a very diverse team as all 12 players played against the Germans. But again it was Arriel McDonald above the rest of the players with 18 points that gave Maccabi this victory, a first step in what the team hopes to be yet another season of reaching at least to the Final Four.

Maccabi started on a 6-0 run and allowed Berlin its first points from the line by Alexis after three minutes. Jiri Zidek, the 2.12-meter center of the German champions surprised Maccabi with three consecutive three-pointers to put Alba ahead with 15-13. Saffar equalized with a good first shot and Berlin with no really good reason let Zidek rest. When Maccabi took a 12-3 run it was obvious it was a big mistake. Maccabi made lots of substitutions to keep everybody fresh. Two great steals towards the end of second half made Maccabi's lead even bigger, with McDonald scoring a three-pointer helped bsend his team to the lockerroom ahead 50-34.

The beginning of the second half was nothing like the end of the first one. Maccabi stopped running and Alba took advantage of that to cut down Maccabis lead to 41-51. After scoring 50 points in the first half Maccabi managed to score only 9 points in the first 8 minutes after the break, but Hussein Besok managed to stop this drought. McDonald continued his excellent game and opened a 74-58 lead midway through the final quarter. Zidek with 20 points and Alexis with 17 tried to get Alba back to the game in the fourth period, but it was to late and too little against Mcdonald, Besok (13 points), Huffman, who added 11 points and the rest of Maccabi.