Israeli Basketball Guard Ron Zipper to Join LSU Men’s Basketball Team for 2025-26 Season

 The LSU men’s basketball team continues to add new players to the its roster with the addition of Israeli basketball guard Ron Zipper.

Zipper, at 6-5, recently played for Hapoel Be’er Sheva in the Israeli Premier Winner League. During the 2024-25 season, he averaged 11.1 points and 2.0 rebounds. He shot 46.7 percent from inside the arc and 36.4 percent from distance (39-of-107), while making 73-of-88 free throws (83.0 percent).

Zipper has also played on Israel’s Youth National teams in FIBA competition, including the 2021 U18 European Challengers and the 2022 and 2023 FIBA U20 European Championship.

He averaged 25.2 points in the five games of the Challengers where he was named the MVP. In the 2023 FIBA U20 competition in seven games, he averaged 11.9 points and 2.6 rebounds a contest as Israel advanced to the finals, winning the silver medal.

“We’re really excited to welcome Ron Zipper to our program and to the state of Louisiana,” said Coach McMahon. “He is a 6-5 highly skilled guard and an excellent three-point shooter. He has tremendous international experience in both the Israel Winner League and multiple European Championship competitions. We look forward to Ron making an immediate impact at LSU.”

During the Winner League season, Zipper had 12 games in double figures with 23 points against Ironi Ness Ziona on 7-of-9 two-point shooting with two three-pointers and 23 against Maccabi Ironi Ramat Gan, making 5-of-5 from three-point range. He also scored 21 against Tel-Aviv, which featured a 7-of-7 night from the free throw line.

Former Tiger basketball star Antonio Blakeney (2015-17), also plays in the Israeli Premier League for basketball, most recently for Hapoel Tel-Aviv.

Zipper, who will be a freshman in eligibility, joins a Tiger roster which at this point includes returnees redshirt junior Jalen Reed and sophomore Robert Miller III.

Transfers joining the team include: PJ Carter (Memphis), Rashad King (Northeastern), Max Mackinnon (Portland), Michael Nwoko (Mississippi State), Marquel Sutton (Omaha), Pablo Tamba (UC Davis) and, Dedan Thomas Jr. (UNLV).

LSU signed three high school players in the November early signing period — Jalen Reece (Orlando, Florida), Mazi Mosley (Los Angeles, California) and Matt Gilhool (Elizabethtown, Pennsylvania).