SAN FRANCISCO, November 23, (THEWILL) – American Michael Burton Brown, head coach of Nigeria’s senior men’s basketball team, D’Tigers, is in Kigali, Rwanda ahead of the AfroBasket 2021 Qualifiers. The competition is billed to kickoff on Friday, November 27 and round up on Sunday, November 29.
Coach Brown arrived in Kigali on Saturday night. He was accompanied by Kuester John, one of his assistants who used to coach the Detroit Pistons.
As a player, Brown played three seasons in the NBA from 1977 to 1980. Then, he took to coaching starting in the college ranks before moving on to the NBA sidelines as an assistant.
Confirming the arrival of the coaches was former national team point guard Musa Adamu who currently serves as the General Manager of the Nigerian team. Adamu stated that the players are expected to start arriving in Kigali from Monday.
Babs Ogunade, Vice President of the Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF), left Lagos for Kigali on Friday ahead of the team as leader of the Nigerian delegation to the tournament. From the camp in Kigali, Ogunade said players were expected to assemble directly from their bases.
“Mike Brown and one of his assistants are here and the players will be coming in on schedule to prepare for the qualifiers.”
Also already in the Rwandan capital are Col. Sam Ahmedu (retd) and referee Kingsley Ojeaburu who have been appointed to serve as officials. They are among the three Nigerians appointed by the world basketball ruling body, FIBA for the November window.
According to the appointments in the FIBA circular, Ahmedu was listed as FIBA Technical Delegate while Kingsley Ojeaburu and Opeyemi Ogunleye will serve as referees.
Ahmedu, who is also FIBA Africa Zone Three President is to serve alongside other technical delegates as Ferrets Jose of Mozambique and Charles Sanders of South Africa.
Ojeaburu will be on duty in Kigali, working with 14 other referees for the duration of the Afrobasket Qualifiers while Ogunleye will move to Alexandra, Egypt.
This second window of the competition has 12 teams from Groups A, B and D in action at the Kigali Arena.
D’Tigers are in Group D against hosts Rwanda, Mali and South Sudan. The Sudanese were brought in to replace Algeria. The Algerians withdrew owing to COVID-19 fears.
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
