{"id":91930,"date":"2026-03-14T23:01:42","date_gmt":"2026-03-15T04:01:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/?p=91930"},"modified":"2026-03-16T06:04:49","modified_gmt":"2026-03-16T11:04:49","slug":"yu-loses-in-sweet-16-as-zevi-samet-puts-up-43-points-in-his-last-game-with-the-maccabees","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/yu-loses-in-sweet-16-as-zevi-samet-puts-up-43-points-in-his-last-game-with-the-maccabees\/","title":{"rendered":"YU loses in Sweet 16, as Zevi Samet puts up 43 points in his last game with the Maccabees"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By PHILISSA CRAMER<\/p>\n<p>(JTA) \u2014 The Yeshiva University Maccabees ended their NCAA championship run on Friday with a Sweet 16 loss to the Emory University Eagles.<\/p>\n<p>The 101-80 loss to a higher-seeded team came amid the \u201celectric atmosphere\u201d that fans of the Orthodox flagship had promised, with star Zevi Samet putting up 43 points in his last game with the Maccabees and fans from near and far outnumbering the home crowd in Atlanta.<\/p>\n<p>Videos posted by Maccabees Live showed Y.U. fans cheering Samet, the team\u2019s all-time top scorer and the holder of the record for most points scored in a single game, with 52.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"500\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Yeshiva fans thanking Zevi Samet for 4 amazing years <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/PyRoEMknM7\">pic.twitter.com\/PyRoEMknM7<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; MacsLive (@MacsLive) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/MacsLive\/status\/2032530532534202503?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 13, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>In a postgame press conference, Samet was asked about his greatest accomplishment during his four years at Y.U.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI think that\u2019s an easy question,\u201d he answered. \u201cGetting to spend Shabbat together, Shabbos with all the guys, getting to spend minyan together every day after practice \u2026&nbsp;The basketball part is fun, but at the end of the day, we\u2019re here in this world for a bigger purpose. And I think friendship is one of the most powerful things. And fact that I\u2019ve been able to build awesome friendships is probably my biggest accomplishment.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Coach Elliot Steinmetz, who has built the Y.U. program over more than a decade, said that even though several of the Maccabees\u2019 strongest players were graduating, he anticipated more success ahead for his team.<\/p>\n<p>Just because it was the first time the Maccabees were playing in the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Division III tournament (after having a game canceled by the pandemic in 2020), he said, doesn\u2019t mean the team is resting on its laurels.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019m probably proud of the fact that these guys are sitting here upset that they lost as opposed to just happy that they were here,\u201d Steinmetz said.<\/p>\n<div style=\"padding-bottom:20px; padding-top:10px;\" class=\"hupso-share-buttons\"><!-- Hupso Share Buttons - https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/ --><a class=\"hupso_toolbar\" href=\"https:\/\/www.hupso.com\/share\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" data-src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\" src=\"data:image\/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==\" class=\"lazyload\" \/><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/buttons\/share-medium.png\" style=\"border:0px; padding-top: 5px; float:left;\" alt=\"Share Button\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">var hupso_services_t=new Array(\"Twitter\",\"Facebook\",\"Google Plus\",\"Pinterest\",\"Linkedin\",\"Tumblr\",\"Email\");var hupso_background_t=\"#EAF4FF\";var hupso_border_t=\"#66CCFF\";var hupso_toolbar_size_t=\"medium\";var hupso_image_folder_url = \"\";var hupso_url_t=\"\";var hupso_title_t=\"YU%20loses%20in%20Sweet%2016%2C%20as%20Zevi%20Samet%20puts%20up%2043%20points%20in%20his%20last%20game%20with%20the%20Maccabees\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"https:\/\/static.hupso.com\/share\/js\/share_toolbar.js\"><\/script><!-- Hupso Share Buttons --><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1491],"tags":[8790,8795,8788,10547,1481],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91930"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91930"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91930\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":91931,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91930\/revisions\/91931"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91930"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91930"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.crescentcityjewishnews.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91930"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}