Two teams (Nigeria and South Sudan) representing Africa at the Basketball event of the ongoing 2024 Olympic Games in Paris stunned their opponents in in their opening fixtures much to the delight of fans in the continent. The teams surprised the basketball world with energetic and scintillating performances.
The Nigeria national women’s basketball team, D’Tigress pulled off a spirited performance to record a stunning 75-62 victory against world number three Opals of Australia in their first match at the 2024 Paris Olympics on Monday morning. The victory at the Pierre Mauroy Stadium was the D’Tigress’s first win at the Olympics since Athens 2004, when they defeated South Korea in an inconsequential classification game after crashing out.
Ezinne Kalu was very instrumental to Nigeria victory and emerged top performer in the encounter, with 19 points, 5 rebounds, 5 assists and 3 steals. Rena Wakama’s team faced an eight-point deficit in the first quarter of the closely contested match. However, the Nigerians mounted a strong comeback, taking a 41-28 lead by halftime. Australia responded by narrowing the gap to just four points by the end of the third quarter. Despite this challenge, D’Tigress held their ground and secured a remarkable 75-62 victory.
This defeat marks Opals of Australia’s second consecutive loss in their opening game of a Women’s Olympic Basketball event, following a previous streak of six consecutive wins. With this victory, Nigeria has become the first African nation to defeat Australia in 12 encounters at the World Cup and Olympics.
In the same vein, the world youngest country shrugged off an anthem blunder by the Olympic Games organisers torecord their first ever men’s basketball victory on their Olympic debut with an astonishing 90-79 victory over Puerto Rico.
Puerto Rico held the lead for most of the first half, but South Sudan took over and demonstrated their resilience by fending off the determined Americas side. Carlik Jones was once again an inspiration for the South Sudanese team, contributing 19 points, 7 rebounds, and 6 assists. His only three-pointer of the game was crucial, extending the lead to 86-73 with just 3:04 left to play.
The victory makes them the third African team to win their opening game at the Olympics, following the Central African Republic in 1988 and Nigeria in 2012. Additionally, this marks only the second time an African team has defeated a team from the Americas in this competition, breaking a streak of 33 consecutive losses. This performance comes less than a year after South Sudan, ranked 33rd in the FIBA World Ranking, made their global debut at the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2023. They earned an impressive 17th place, securing a direct spot at the Olympics as the highest-finishing African team at FIBA’s flagship event.
