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The Nigerian national women’s basketball team popularly known as D’Tigress has established dominance on the African basketball space but their success on the continental stage was not achieved overnight, it took years of hard work and surprises on the global stage for D’Tigress to arrive at this point where every national team in Africa gets scared at the sound of their name.

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At the 2018 FIBA Women’s World Cup in Spain, D’Tigress were one of the underdogs and highly underrated. Of the sixteen teams that competed at the tournament, Nigeria was second in the least ranked teams in Tenerife, placing 42^nd in the FIBA basketball ranking, while the least ranked nation, Belgium placed 78^th.

The Nigerian side was just making their second World Cup appearance since FIBA gave African nations slots in 1970 to compete at the global showpiece. D’Tigress first world cup outing in Brazil, 2006, was dismal as they finished last, and during the 2018 edition, they were placed in the same group (Group B) with the likes of Australia, Turkey (ranked 7^th) and Argentina (ranked 16^th ). The globe felt like the Nigerian side was in Spain just for the show, but D’Tigress had something to prove to the world. Nigeria at the time was ranked sixth in FIBA Africa despite winning the FIBA Afrobasket for the first time in 12 years (2017) to qualify for the world cup and had never won a world cup game.

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After losing their first game on Saturday, September 22nd, 2018, against Australia (86-68), D’Tigress on Sunday, September 23rd, 2018, shocked the world with a massive 74-68 points win against Turkey to earn their first world cup win, becoming only just the second African side to win a FIBA World Cup game behind Senegal that won their first game on the same day against Latvia. The Nigerians would go ahead to prove that their victory over Turkey was no fluke or luck after beating Argentina (70-75) in their next game, before recording a third win against Greece (57-56) to qualify for the quarterfinals of the tournament, a feat the world felt they could not achieve. Despite a 71-40 loss to world champions, the USA in the quarterfinals, D’Tigress announced their presence on the global stage in 2018 and has gone on to become one of the best basketball nations in the world currently. Sources: The Undefeated Wikipedia Featured Image Source: The Whistler NG

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This article was first published on 2nd June 2021

ugo-chinedu

I am a Lion, I love to hit heights that seem impossible so I can motivate others and prove doubters wrong. For me, impossible is nothing. I'm open to learning and I love to read, travel and meet new faces.