Nigeria claim third straight Afrobasket title as Lionesses finish ninth
After finishing 11th with no win in the 2019 edition of the Fiba AfroBasket championship, Kenya national women’s basketball team, Lionesses, made a remarkable improvement this year to finish ninth.
Lionesses achieved the feat after finishing second in Group A with three points from one win against Cape Verde (61-58) and one defeat to hosts Cameroon (74-50) to qualify to the tournament’s pre-quarterfinal playoff where they met Mozambique but found it hard to go to make it to the last eight, losing 72-50 to the Mozambican side.
Meanwhile, Nigeria made history as the only second country after Senegal in 1974-1981, to win the women’s Afrobasket for the third consecutive editions.
D’Tigress, as the Nigerian women’s team is called, achieved the three-peat feat after beating Mali 70-59 in an entertaining final played at Palais Polyvalent des Sports in Yaounde, Cameroon on Sunday night.
Hosts Cameroon finished third after edging out 11-time champions Senegal 53-49 in the third-place playoff game.
Senegal settled for fourth place, Mozambique (5th), Egypt (6th), Côte d’Ivoire (7th), Angola (8th), Kenya (9th), Cape Verde (10th), Tunisia (11th) and hapless Guinea in 12th and last position.
Nigeria’s captain Adaora Elonu emerged the tournament’s Most Valuable Player (MVP) after the four-time Women’s AfroBasket participant, who plies her trade in Spain, coordinated the D’Tigress to a third straight continental title.
Adaora was also named in the all-tournament team, joining her teammate and 2019 MVP, Ezinne Kalu, Senegal’s Yacine Diop, Cameroon’s youthful forward Marina Paule Ewodo and Mali’s massive centre Mariam Coulibaly.
Mozambican Tamara Seda was the best rebounder with a total of 52 rebounds as Egypt swingman Nadine Mohammed won the best scorer award with 101 points while Cote D’Ivoire guard Salimata Berte won the best three-pointer award with 16 shots from behind the arch.
Cape Verde was awarded the fair-play award of the championship as the trio of Astou Traore of Senegal, Nacissela Mauricio of Angola and Aisha Mohammed Balarabe of Nigeria were honoured by FIBA Africa for their dedication to the sport and their national teams
