Basketball: Kwara Falcons Face Defending Champions, Four Others As BAL Releases Fixtures

Basketball: Kwara Falcons Face Defending Champions, Four Others As BAL Releases Fixtures 

By Niyi Busari

2022 Nigeria Basketball Federation league champions, Kwara Falcons will have a mountain to climb when they face the Basketball African League defending champions US Monastir in the group stage, 

Debutants, Falcons will slug it out with Rwanda Energy Group (REG) in their first group opener of the Basketball African League playoff on Sunday 12th March, 2023.

Kwara Falcons are grouped in Sahara Conference which consist of Abidjan Basketball Club (ABC Fighters) and AS Douanes of Senegal. Others are; Stade Malien of Mali, defending champions Union Sportive Monastirienne – US Monastir (Tunisia) and Rwanda Energy Group (REG). 

On Tuesday, the Nigeria champions will trade tackles with Stade Malien. US Monastir will slug it out with Kwara Falcons in their third group game before facing AS Douanes and ABC Fighters in their fourth and fifth matches of the playoff on 18th and 20th February, respectively. 

The 12 teams that qualify for this year's Basketball African League include defending champions, US Monastir (Tunisia) and five other teams returning from the 2022 season. Five teams will compete in the BAL for the first time, including the first BAL teams from Côte d’Ivoire and Uganda: Abidjan Basket Club (Côte d’Ivoire), Al Ahly (Egypt), City Oilers (Uganda), Kwara Falcons (Nigeria) and Stade Malien (Mali). AS Douanes (Senegal) returns to the BAL after participating in the inaugural season in 2021. 

The season opener will feature AS Douanes taking on Abidjan Basket Club on March 11 at 4:00 p.m. GMT. US Monastir will begin its title defense on Sunday, March 12 at 5:30 p.m. GMT against Stade Malien.

The 12 teams will once again be divided into two conferences – the Sahara Conference and the Nile Conference. Each conference will play a 15-game group phase during which each team will face the other five teams in its conference once. The Sahara Conference’s group phase will take place at the Dakar Arena from March 11-21, and the Nile Conference’s group phase will take place at Hassan Mostafa Indoor Sports Complex in Cairo from April 26 - May 6. The top four teams from each conference will qualify for the BAL Playoffs and Finals, which will feature a single-elimination tournament at BK Arena in Kigali from May 21-27.

The Nile Conference teams are; Cape Town Tigers (South Africa), Al Ahly (Egypt), City Oilers (Uganda) Clube Ferroviário da Beira - CFV Beira (Mozambique), Club Atlético Petróleos de Luanda - Petro de Luanda (Angola), Seydou Legacy Athlétique Club - SLAC (Guinea).

The quarterfinals will hold on 21st and 22nd May while semifinals are scheduled for 25th May.

The Third place and final are scheduled to hold on 27th May, 2023.