ONN Magazine Nigeria's First E-Magazine
The Nigerian female basketball team, D’Tigress made Nigeria proud after defeating the defending champion in both group stage and final to emerge the winner after waiting for twelve years for the coveted trophy. Unknown to many, the victory wouldn’t have come if the team, coached by Sam Vincent did not do certain ‘rituals’.
The first ‘ritual’ performed by D’Tigress was unity. Investigations carried out by ONN reveals that the team made up of home and foreign based players never discriminated against each other. As a matter of fact, they were an indivisible unit as they prayed together, did a lot of things together as if they all belonged top the same ethnic and religious entities.
Second ‘ritual’ came from the coach and the government as a source close to the team told ONN that the team had new kit and every payment due to them was disbursed as at when due; this ensured maximum concentration that gave the coach the rare opportunity to play his own part diligently and professionally.
The third ‘ritual’ was the arrival of Musa Kida, the President of Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF) at the venue of the tournament last Thursday; this according to our source ensured a double confidence and an unprecedented emergence of spirit of determination among the members of the team. “…every member including the coaching crew was determined to settle for nothing but the trophy”, the source told ONN.
The victorious team has been rewarded by the president of Nigeria, Mohammed Buhari with each player carting away a million Naira each while the coach got half a million. D’Tigress defeated Senegalese team by 65-48 last Sunday to emerge Afro BasketBall champion and qualified for the world tournament proper.
