The ongoing Nestle Milo Secondary Schools Basketball Championship zonal conferences will hit the Western Conference on Thursday, May 14, in Ibadan and will end on May 20, with Anambra, Delta, Ekiti, FCT Abuja, Kwara, Lagos, Ogun, Osun and Oyo in attendance.
The Western Conference battle will be the last of the zonal conferences since it started last April 22 in Lokoja, Kogi State, with hostilities in the Confluence Conference, and later moved to Benin, Edo State, for the Atlantic Conference which dunked off on April 30.
Action later shifted to Akure, Ondo State, with the Central Conference which dunked off on May 7, to end on May 13.
At each of the conferences, the first-placed teams in both the boys and girls categories went home with the championship trophies and various amounts of cash rewards for the development of sports facilities in their respective schools.
Meanwhile, the national finals will come up from June 1 to 6 at the Indoor Sports Hall of the National Stadium, Surulere, Lagos. Saturday, June 6, is the grand finale.
Every team participating in the national finals will receive N200,000. Winners will go home with additional N150,000. The second-placed team will receive N120,000 and third-placed N100,000. They will also receive trophies and lots of Milo goodies.
Organisers of the championship, the Nigeria School Sport Federation (NSSF), in partnership with the National Collegiate Sports Foundation (NCSF), and the sponsors, Nestle Nigeria Plc., have promised a befitting national finals.
President of the NSSF, Ibrahim Muhammed, said plan is on by both the NSSF and the NCSF to ensure that the 12 teams get exposure outside the country.
He said: “By the special and gracious approval of the various state governments, the 12 teams (six male and six female) that qualified for the national final will be registered for different international school sport programmes across the globe.
“The two bodies will also come up with a select team of 12 players to represent Nigeria in a West Africa School Basketball tournament in October later in the year.”
