2023 FIBA Afrobasket: Can Nigeria Tie Senegal's Four African Titles In A Row?

2023 FIBA Afrobasket: Can Nigeria Tie Senegal's Four African Titles In A Row?

Reigning FIBA Women’s AfroBasket, Nigeria are set to make their 14th appearance in the Championship but will do so with a task in mind.

That task is equaling a record four straight wins currently held by Senegal.

Back in 2021, D'Tigress - as the Nigeria Women's national team is fondly called - recorded a third consecutive win of the title when they defeated Mali 70-59 in the Final of the FIBA Women's AfroBasket held in Yaounde, Cameroon.

Before the win in Yaounde, Nigeria had won the tournament in 2017 (Mali) and 2019 (Senegal) to become the second African team to win three or more titles in the competition since Senegal clinched the trophy four times in a row from 1974, 1977, 1979 and 1981.

According to the records, Nigeria's last defeat in the Women's AfroBasket happened on October 2, 2015, in the Semi-Final of the Women's AfroBasket against host Cameroon in Yaounde.

With the victory against Mali in the 2021 Final, Nigeria extended their Women's AfroBasket winning streak to 19-0 after winning all their five games in the latest edition of the tournament.

Though Senegal hold a record eleven titles in total against Nigeria's five, D'Tigress will be attempting to equal the four straight wins of Senegal when the Final Round of the 2023 FIBA Women's AfroBasket holds in Rwanda from July 28 to August 6.

Before the winning streak began in the Third-Place Game of the 2015 FIBA Women's AfroBasket, Nigeria’s performance had dangled in several positions from 5th in 1974, 7th in 1981, 3rd in 1997, 5th in 2007 and 2009, 4th in 2011, 6th in 2013 to 3rd place in 2015.

The opposition in the 2023 edition of the Championship will be a lot stiffer with Senegal, Mali, Cote d'Ivoire, Cameroon and Angola also as frontrunners and other qualified teams that make up the 12-team will be eager to dent Nigeria's run.

The twelve teams are split into four groups of three teams with Nigeria drawn alongside Egypt and DR Congo. The first-place team qualify directly for the quarterfinals while the other two teams go through a playoff round.

A second-placed team will face off against a third-placed team and vice versa. A knockout system will be used after the preliminary round and the losing teams of the quarterfinals will be playing classification games while the winners will play out the champion

-FIBA