By CHARLES MUTEBI

FIBA Africa Zone V Championship

Women:

Uganda 81 Rwanda 68

Ugandan wins bronze

Men:

Uganda 87 Tanzania 63

Ugandan finishes 5th


The women got bronze, the men finished fifth. But there is no shortage of voices describing the 2013 FIBA Africa Zone Five Afrobasket championship in Tanzania as a success for Uganda.

They include both of Uganda’s head coaches. Men’s coach Mandy Juruni and his ladies’ counterpart Timothy Odeke are united in the view that the one-week tournament that attracted seven countries was filled with positives for Uganda.

“The tournament was a success in terms of the way we played,” said Juruni.

“I think we played good basketball but we were unlucky to lose close games especially the one against Rwanda (90-85), which eliminated us from qualification. (Still,) I am disappointed because we didn’t deserve to be number five.”

Egypt scooped the men’s title after an 82-75 victory over Rwanda on the closing day as Uganda settled for a classification win over Tanzania. But there is some comfort to be drawn from the fact that both finalists came out of Uganda’s group. And not without a fight from Juruni’s outfit.

Egypt and Rwanda were made to sweat for their victories over Uganda, a fact that owed little to the draining Dar es Salaam temperatures and a lot to the quality of our national team.

That’s why Juruni believes that: “We have a good future ahead of us. Our performance here has built a good foundation.”

Odeke is just as optimistic after the display of his team, which climaxed with an 81-63 triumph over 2012 champions Rwanda.

Odeke observed: “This tournament was a success because we played with a lot of cohesion. Even the games we lost, we played well but you could see those teams were clearly superior to us. I think we can build on this for the future.”

The Uganda men were third of four last year while the women came fourth out five.
Coaches hail Uganda’s show at Zone V tourney