By Bamidele Boluwaji:
Nigeria’s men’s basketball team D’Tigers will play Scotland on Wednesday morning in a bid to qualify for the semi-final stage of the Gold Coast 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia despite losing all their preliminary games, Completesportsnigeria.com reports.
New Zealand defeated the Nigerians 110-65 points in their opening game, while they lost 82-67 to Canada in their second game and got beaten 97-55 points by host nation Australia in their final group game on Monday.
But with the rules guiding the games, the 2015 FIBA AfroBasket champions still have a lifeline to remain in the competition and also compete for a medal.
According to the rules guiding the competition, top two teams from Group A which are Australia and New Zealand have qualified for the semi-final stage while the last two teams, which are Canada and Nigeria have been paired against the top two teams from Group B which is considered a weak group that needs to be developed.
With the pairing, Canada who came third in Group A will meet England for a semi-final ticket while Nigeria’s D’Tigers will face Scotland.
Winners between Nigeria and Scotland will face either Australia or New Zealand in the semi-finals while the winner between Canada and England will also advance to the last four stages.
After losing all three games in the preliminary stage, Nigeria finished the first round with three points in Group A while Scotland top Group B with six points.
The Nigeria versus Scotland match will be played at the Cairns Convention Centre on Wednesday morning.
Meanwhile, in the game against Australia, D’Tigers’ captain Ike Diogu recorded 19 points and six assists, God’sgift Achiuwa contributed eight points and six rebounds while Eli Dung and Uchechi Ofoegbu added six points respectively to the 97-55 points defeat suffered in the last group game on Monday.
In the Classification released by the organizers on Monday, both Cameroun and India finished the competition in seventh and eighth positions respectively.
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