D’Tigress beat Senegal 60-53 to win 2017 Afrobasket
Nigeria’s senior Women basketball team, D’Tigress yesterday defeated arch-rivals Senegal 60-53 in the finals of the 2017 Afrobasket Women Championship in Bamako Mali for their third African title.
The gruelling encounter was a repeat of the 2015 finals when D’Tigress defeated Senegal 64-57 for their second title having won the first in 2003 in Mozambique.
D’Tigress had beaten Senegal 58-54 in their last group match so yesterday’s match was a grudge one as the Senegalese came all out for their pound of flesh but propelled by Adaora Elonu, Ndidi Madu, Evelyn Akhator and kalu Ezinne, D’Tigress stood firm to emerge champions.
As expected victory did not come easy for the D’Tigress as they had to dig deep in the last two quarters to overwhelm their opponents.
Although they took the first quarter 18-12, the Senegalese stormed back to win the second quarter 21-10 but D’Tigress won the third 15-7 and subdued their opponents 17-13 in the last quarter.
Thus, D’Tigress won the championship without dropping a single match on the way as they had won all group matches against Mozambique, Egypt, Congo DR, Guinea and former champions Senegal before beating Cote D’Ivoire in the quarter-finals and the host nation Mali in the semi-finals.
The coach Sam Vincent tutored D’Tigress will represent Africa in the 2018 World Cup in Spain.