10th January, 2011
With the feats achieved in 2010 and the foundation laid for the development of basketball in the country, 2011 promises to be a very busy year for the sport as the senior national teams, D’Tigers and D’Tigrees get set for the FIBA-Africa Nations Cup in Mail and Cote d’Ivoire respectively.
Apart from the Nations Cup, the teams will participate in the All Africa Games in Mozambique, while the national Under-19 Women team will feature in the FIBA World Championship in Chile this year.
The year is also expected to be busy on the local scene with the DSTV Premier League dunking off later this month and Zenith Bank-sponsored women’s league will also commence as schedules because of the national team’s involvement in continental competitions.
The Nigeria Basketball Federation, NBBF, at the end of its inaugural meeting, has concluded plans to organise a national Under 16 men and women tournament, which starts with the zonal preliminaries and a national open women championship.
The tournament will start at two conference levels and end with a national final. The national Division One championship, which was held last year for teams to gain promotion to the DSTV Premier League, will also hold this year as well as a Division Two tourney.
Also, the coaches and players’ education programme at the age group level has been approved for this year with the aim of institutionalising a national basketball philosophy.
President of the federation, Tijjani Umar, told Basketball Timeout that the board is ready to improve on the standard of the game, hence their decision to keep the players busy.
Umar said there is need to update the sport administrators including coaches and referees on the latest development of the game.
He said his board plans to do this by organising regular seminars and clinics for the officials, players and coaches.
Lati Erinfolami, Head Coach of First Deepwater Basketball Club, the Zenith Bank League champions, said he is looking forward to 2011 with lots of expectations, while hoping that all the programmes laid out by the federation will hold as scheduled.
Head coach of the national Under 19 team, Aderemi Adewunmi, believes the year can be a turning point for the game,. He called all the stakeholders to come together and join the federation in moving the game to the next level.
