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Braves Rep Ghana at FIBA Africa Club Championship Qualifiers

Braves have remained the best basketball team in Ghana for over a decade with their dominance of the Accra league. They're currently in Liberia participating in the FIBA Africa Zone 3 Club Championship Qualifiers. A competition held by FIBA Africa for the best basketball clubs in their respective countries annually.
Braves practice in Accra prior to the tournament
Six teams from Ghana, Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria showed up for this year's qualifiers of which the top two will represent the zone in the FIBA Africa Club Championships later in the year.

 The competition is being ran in a round-robin format. Braves are currently second on the table (after winning 2 of their 3 games) behind Kano Pillars who remain unbeaten. They won their first game against the Pythons(Liberia) 68-34, lost the second one against Kano Pillars(Nigeria) 59-84 and won the third against YSM(Sierra Leone) 66-44.

 The tournament continues today for Braves who have two more games to play against Union Bank(Nigeria) today at 4 pm local time and the last game against LPRC Oilers(Liberia) tomorrow.

 Reports that the team's best player Dodzie Baniba was injured were confirmed by the team's manager Benjamin Baafi. "Yes, that was in the second game, but he's fine and is managing to play now" He answered on phone from Monrovia. "The guys are really making Ghana Basketball proud. They're playing very well and their composure is on point" He added.
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Video: 2013 AfroBasket Day 2 Top 5 Plays

Al Farouq Aminu baptizes the Sengeal defense!
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Video: 2013 AfroBasket Day 1 Top 5 Plays

Defense, dimes, dunks and Senegal's shot with 0.2secs on the clock highlight opening day at this year's AfroBasket.
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What Are We Not Doing Right?


Angola's bench looking dejected during their loss against Turkey at the 2012 London Olympics
Contrary to popular speculations, African teams have been present from day one at both the FIBA World Cup and Olympics basketball competitions; both times being represented by Egypt in 1936 and 1950 respectively. Over the decades, several African countries have followed suit and sent teams to participate in international competitions for all age groups and both sexes.

As exciting as it is to see African teams go on such trips, it cannot be denied that performance by teams over the decades is nothing to be excited about. The best performance by an African team at an international event was when Egypt finished 5th in the first ever FIBA World Cup in 1950. The most recent international competition that featured teams from Africa is the just ended FIBA U19 World Championship in Prague, Czech Republic. Senegal and Cote d'Ivoire represented the continent in Prague after dominating the African Championships in 2012 only to finish at the bottom of the table, both often losing games by as much 30 points.

 These perennial losing streaks should have us thinking by now. If basketball has been played for as many decades on the continent as it has in other places, why are our teams still losing by this much and performing poorly at these events? Players, coaches, and national federations have to sit up and figure out a future out of this endless cycle of losing. What do you think we are not doing properly?
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What's FIBA Africa Doing About 3x3?


FIBA 3x3 has been in existence since 2007. It was launched and a trial tournament was played in the same year at the Asian Indoor Games in Macau. Two years later, it was introduced internationally at the 2009 Asian Youth Games in Singapore.

Over the years, all FIBA zones have had 3x3 events which have drawn lots of fans to the game because of its appeal to the ordinary playground baller. Last year(2012) was probably the most successful year in 3x3 history, having seen the launch of the 3x3 World Tour that went to six different cities across the globe with the finals played in Miami between 21st and 23rd September. The 3x3 World Championships event that featured separate competitions for men's, women's and mixed national teams tourney was also hosted by Greece in August; Spain also hosted the U18 World Championships in August.

Evidently, these events have helped to increase the popularity of the game of basketball worldwide and more so in the host and participating countries. Africa basketball can and must benefit form this simple, beautiful and easily attainable FIBA initiative too. It's been six years since the launch of 3x3 by FIBA and not much of it has been seen on the African continent apart from a few isolated events organized by individual basketball organizations, an example being the Central Recreational Basketball League organized in Accra by DC Dynamics and ReboundGH with the help of several volunteers in October and November last year. Check out more photos from the CRBL here.

FIBA Africa has not hosted any 3x3 events so far and there are no signs of them hosting any soon. This, definitely is not good for the development of the discipline and the game as a whole on the continent. FIBA Africa's administration and management has never been under much scrutiny from its member countries. In my opinion, it's time for the African basketball family to demand more from their offices not only concerning 3x3 but the development of the game on the continent as a whole.
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Primeiro de Agosto are Africa Champs!!!

The 27th edition of the FIBA Africa champions' cup closed in Malabo over the weekend with a keenly contested all-Angolan final game. Primeiro de Agosto beat Petro 80-69 to win the trophy for the 8th time in the team's history.
Morais with his trophies

 Carlos Morais of Petro was MVP, leading the tournament in scoring with a 21.4ppg and also leading the tournament in 3 pointers made with a total of 30 while Tarek El-Ghanem (Al-Ahly) led in rebounds with 10 per game.
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2012 FIBA Africa Champions' Cup Commences

Photo credit: fibaafrica.com
Thursday marked the commencement of the 2012 FIBA Africa Champions Cup in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea. The annual event is FIBA Africa's gathering of the best basketball clubs and is played by the champions of the leagues of various African countries. 

 This year's event has twelve teams from nine different countries participating and will be ending on December 8. The teams have been grouped into two of six apiece.

Group A
1-MONGOMO (Equatorial Guinea)
2 - hope (Rwanda)
3-ETTEHAD (Egypt)
4-LIBOLO (Angola)
5 - ABC (Ivory Coast)
6-MANGA BB (Gabon)

 Group B
1-ESS (Tunisia)
2-AL AHLY (Egypt)
3-KANO PILLARS (Nigeria)
4-PRIMEIRO (Angola)
5-PETRO (Angola)
6-ASB MAZEMBE (DR Congo)

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DR Congo Forfeits AfroBasket U18

FIBA Africa website reports that three days into competition, the Democratic Republic of Congo's team has still not shown up in Maputo and have ruled out of the event. As such the number of teams participating in the event now has been reduced to eleven instead of the original twelve. Group A, which includes Ghana has now been reduced to five teams.

DR Congo qualified for the tourney after coming tops in the FIBA Africa Zone IV tournament, an event that just between them and neighboring Congo-Brazzaville due absence of other member countries not showing up. Other members of zone IV include Cameron, Central African Republic, Chad, São Tomé and Príncipe, Gabon and Equatorial Guinea
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