Pius Ayinor
Nigeria’s men’s basketball team D’Tigers
on Thursday defeated Gabon 88-64 to qualify for the semi-finals of the
2015 Afrobasket. Nigeria will now face rivals Senegal in the semi-finals
on Saturday after the West Africans defeated Algeria 75-58 in a late
quarterfinals match. The Africa Nations Cup is holding in Tunisia.
Nigeria dominated the game all through
just as they did with the Wednesday match played against Mozambique.
D’Tigers outscored Gabon, 23-11 in the first quarter and then made it
26-14 in the second quarter. It was a similar pattern in the third
quarters but Gabon rallied to win the fourth quarter 30-16. It made
little difference as Nigeria coasted to victory.
Al-Farouq
Aminu, Michael Umeh and Michael Gbinije combined for 43 Nigeria points
as Will Voigt’s men were in control for much of the contest.
Their opponents had arrived at the venue
a day after performing one of the biggest upsets in the tournament by
eliminating Cape Verde, but Gabon seemed powerless to oppose Nigeria’s
determination in reaching the last four of the tournament. Senegal
stopped the Nigerian run in Cote d’Ivoire 2013 at the quarterfinal
stage.
Therence Mayimba, Aymar-Kabrel Boundou
and Stephan Lasme were the only Gabonese to score in double digits but
were unable to prevent their team from being eliminated.
Nigeria made it to the semi-finals for
the first time since 2011. The first was achieved in Dakar in 1997 after
which the Tigers finished as runners-up in the following two
tournaments.
D’Tigers’ brilliance was well
highlighted by Aminu, who led the score chart again with 17 points while
his younger brother, Alade grabbed 10 rebounds. Gbinije hit 15 points
from 22 minutes of play in the game.
Stan Okoye who was part of the team that
lost in the quarterfinals to Senegal in 2013 said he was happy the team
crossed to the semis. He then expressed confidence in the Tigers
ability to fight all the way.
“I am very optimistic we can win this thing but we got to take this one step at a time,” Okoye said.
Lagos Islanders player Ben Uzoh had 6 points, 6 assists and 5 steals with Oguchi and Lawal adding 8 and 6 points respectively.
Alade tweeted after the match, “Another big win, All Glory to God. On the path to making history. Bleed Green.”
Alade had good reasons to celebrate as
the victory had steadied Nigeria in position to qualify for the 2016 Rio
Summer Olympics if they win their next match. Nigeria had to do the
world qualifiers to make it to the London 2012 Olympics which became the
first for the Nigerian men. The Nigerian ladies were at the Athens 2004
Olympics.
The winners of the competition will secure automatic ticket to the Rio 2016 Olympics
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