By Iyalla Adaye Port Harcourt
Th e Nigeria Basketball Federation has swung into immediate action following its inauguration on Friday in Abuja by the Honorable Minister of Youth and Sports, Barrister Solomon Dalung. Th e NBBF Technical committee announced the appointment of Vincent James Samuel as the new Head coach of the Women Senior National team replacing Scott Nnaji ahead of the 2017 FIBA Afrobasket Tournament.
Th is was made known following the invitation of 29 players to camp in Nigeria and United States of America ahead of the apex women’s championship in Africa holding in Mali. Vincent who led the team to a 68-64 victory at the 2004 Olympics over South Korea (the fi rst ever victory by an African nation in an Olympic women’s basketball contest) was handed the task of winning Nigeria’s third Afrobasket trophy. Meanwhile, the team made up of 17 foreign based and 12 home based players are expected to report to camp today Monday 24th of July, 2017. According to the release signed by the Secretary of the NBBF, the foreign based players will converge on Orlando, Florida while the home based alongside some of their foreign based counterparts such as Sarah Ogoke, Uju Ugoka
and Adaora Elonu holidaying in Nigeria will converge on Lagos. Meanwhile, the Orlando camp will be led by D’Tigress captain, Helen Ogunjimi alongside Ezinne Kalu, Promise Amukamara, Adaeze Alaeze, Ayoleka Sodade, Ndidi Madu, Cecilia Okoye, Aisha Mohammed, Patience Okpe, Sarah Imovbioh, Ugo Nwaigwe, Balogun Elizabeth, Joyce Ekworomadu and Evelyn Akhator. In Lagos, the 11 players will sweat it out under the watchful eyes of Peter Ahmedu and Okworogu Ochuko who were also newly named as part of the new technical crew.
