Nigeria senior men’s national team, D’Tigers finished second in the PEAK International Invitational tournament in China tagged “Atlas Basketball Challenge” on Sunday.
D’Tigers lost 93-78 in the final to the United States of America after a 73-72 win over the Iranians in the semis 24 hours earlier.
They also won two out of three group games enroute to the semi-final, 77-71 win over Czech Republic in game 1, 81-88 loss to China and then bounced back in the third game to beat Germany 77-70.
Nigeria played without the full compliment of their squad. They had just 6 at the start of the tournament which later increased to 8 then 11 due to flight issues.
Players who represented the country include: Agada Caleb ( prat, Spain), Omoerah Keith (Baerum Basket, Norway), Braxton Ogbueze ( University of North Carolina , Charlotte) USA, Tosin Mehinti ( Lavro,Greece), Okosun Augustine ( Sameji , Dominican Rep), and Obekpa Christopher (Tranzaspor, Turkey). They all made the roster for the 2019 FIBA World Cup Qualifiers in February and June.
While Ogundiran Jordan (California polytechnic university, Pomona)USA, Edogi Andrew (Iona College, New Rochelle, NY),Vincent Gabriel (University California Santa Barbara) USA, Toluwase Samuel (Thames Valley Cavaliers (United Kingdom) and Adegoko Abiodun (FRY Macedonia) were recently added for the Invitational tournament.
The “Atlas Challenge” gave D’Tigers head coach, Alex Nwora an opportunity to check other talented Nigerian players in diaspora as they prepare for the fourth window of the 2019 FIBA World Cup Qualifiers in September.
Nigeria is grouped in F alongside Senegal, Central Africa Republic and Cote d’Ivoire.
