By: Mohamed Abu Conteh
The Sierra Leone Basketball Under-16 boys have returned home safely after participation in the FIBA U16 AfroBasket Tournament in Rwanda.
A Tournament that left the boys frustrated by their performance as their group comprises; Côte D’Ivoire, Rwanda and Angola. Our boys lost all 3 games, but there are a lot of positives from their participation that would make the basketball family back home proud.
Their first game against the Côte D’Ivoire (112-27 points) was the worst as the team got a whooping defeat as a result of jet-lag from long travelling and layovers. The team improved in the second and third games, even though they were defeated. The biggest challenges faced during preparation and arrival time and date in Kigali.
The technical team gets their preparation and put on an improvement in the second encounter against host Rwanda losing 65-47 points.
The growing anticipation of improving through the tournament and possibly qualifying from the group was dented after the boys’ last game ended in a more frustrating loss, 65-37.
The team returned home on late Tuesday, 16th September 2025 with some amount of pride as one of the outstanding performers of the tournament is our 15-year-old 6ft 9inches tall Benjamin Davis. His stats speak in two of the 3 games he played. He was classified among the top 5 performers on 2 different days with very high indicators, which include 22 rebounds in the game against Rwanda and more.
Benjamin Davis was so outstanding that he was awarded a scholarship to the NBA Academy in Senegal for a year and left the squad together with the Sierra Leone Basketball Federation’s President, Ali Hijaz, to Senegal for a tryout at the NBA Academy.
An achievement of President Ali and the executive has put the country’s basketball in the limelight not only at the continental level but also globally.
“We are making progress, as a country where basketball is not prioritised. This showcase of our performance at the continental stage is a huge gain and portrays our effort in changing the narrative. We will get there, it’s a matter of time” President Ali expressed.