Nigeria league champion Royal Hoopers basketball club of Port Harcourt yesterday recorded it first win in the 26th FIBA Africa Champions Cup for Men. It recorded a 111-42 points win over Malabo Kings of Equatorial Guinea to finish in the eleventh position.
Royal Hoopers paid for coming late to the championship by finishing at the bottom in group-B and failed to record any win. Against the Equatorial Guineans, they proved the better side from the blast of the referees’ whistle winning in all four quarters by 24-10, 29-03, 28-16 and 30-13 points. The Nigerian side out-played their opponent who won only a match in the championship through a walk-over the Nigerian side last Wednesday. Royal Hoopers had a total of 40 rebounds to Kings 17.
The Hoopers coached by former Nigeria international Ogoh Odaudu had a cumulative of 14 assists to their opponents 5 gave and 15 steals to the Kings 7.
Hoopers’ point guard, Moses Daudu led the floor with 25 points, 3 rebounds, 2 assists and 2 steals, Farouk Oyalade had a double of 16 points, 12 rebounds, 3 assists and 2 steals, Musa Usman added 17 points with the duo of Mattew Onmonya and Kingsley Aguara contributing 16 points, 6 rebounds, 3 steals and 12 points, 4 rebounds for their side’s finish.
Meanwhile, Union Bank which lost to Etoile Sportive du Sahel by 69-113 in the quarter-final on Monday will take on losers between CRD Libolo of Angola and ASB Mazembe of DR Congo for position 7and 8 today after losing classification game 64-78 points to Chabab Rif ALHoceima of Morocco yesterday. ??