Stakeholders in the Nigeria Basketball Federation (NBBF) have decried the present fortune of the country’s basketball at the wake of the latest International Basketball Federation (FIBA) World Ranking for men.
In the latest FIBA rankings released last Monday, Nigeria’s national men’s team, D’Tigers, dropped six places from the 17th position to the 24th.
Despite dropping six places, Nigeria still maintains third position in Africa behind unmoved Tunisia in the 23rd and African champions, Angola, who dropped one place to the 16th.
“It is not a good development for the country, and that means we need to buckle up in the game if we really want to be relevant in the continent,” said one of the stakeholders who pleaded anonymity.
Another stakeholder, who doesn’t want to be named, said all hands must be on deck to reposition the country’s basketball.
“We all must come together and help develop the game of basketball in the country. What the latest FIBA World Ranking means is that we are not improving.
“It means that we are not developing, and for us to be there, we must all come together for the growth of the game.
“It is sad, but there is nothing we can do for now rather than come together for the development of the game,” he said.
West African neighbours, Senegal, emerged the biggest movers in the ranking, moving up 11 places to 30th and fourth in Africa, after an impressive World Cup in Spain.
Egypt, despite failing to win a game at the World Cup, took a giant leap up five places on the world rankings to 41 and sixth in Africa behind Cote d’Ivoire in Africa who dropped by one place to 37th. The rest of Africa’s top 10 on the rankings include Cameroon (43rd), Cape Verde (50th), Central African Republic (55th) and Morocco in the 59th position in the world.
The United States, Spain, Argentina and Lithuania remain the top four countries in the FIBA Men World Ranking.
France, after winning her first world basketball medal by overcoming Lithuania in the third place match, moved up three places to fifth. While surprise World Cup finalist, Serbia, moved to seventh from 11th place behind Russia who remained unmoved in sixth. Turkey, Brazil and Greece complete the top 10 basketball nations in the world, according to the FIBA release.
Nigeria’s national basketball team joined FIBA in 1964. Recently, the team has enjoyed success, due to an increasing amount of talents from Nigeria as well as an orchestrated recruitment of American college and professional players of Nigerian descent. A team dominated by Nigerian-Americans qualified for the 2006 FIBA World Championship, marking only the second time in the country’s history that they qualified to the FIBA World Cup.
Eight players on the team that represented Nigeria at the 2009 FIBA AfroBasket tournament were born in the United States. Nigeria also qualified to the 2012 Summer Olympics.