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Kenya faces important task against South Sudan after losing Afrobasket Qualifiers opener

Kenya Lionesses did themselves dirty with a 78-56 loss to the Ugandans

Kenya’s start at the FIBA Women’s AfroBasket Zone 5 Qualifiers in Cairo, Egypt was not promising at all with a rare loss to neighbors Uganda.

With a tricky South Sudan fixture coming up, the Kenya Lionesses did themselves dirty with a 78-56 loss to the Ugandans in what was not a pleasing sight for the bench. The Ugandans nicknamed Gazelles did well to contain the Kenyans at the Hassan Moustafa Sports Hall and led 40-28 at the end of the third quarter.

Team captain Jane Asinde led from the front, scoring 24 points. She also had four steals and an equal number of assists in what was a good outing for her team. Paige Robinson and Shakira Nanvubya also reached double figures with 15 and 14 points respectively.

Kenya dominated play 38-14 and scored 17-5 off fast breaks. They were led by 2021 MVP Victoria Reynolds who scored 13 points, one more than Mercy Wanyama, but their slow start proved costly for George Mayienga’s side.

Mayienga blamed their slow start and poor decision-making for the defeat, saying: “Catching up was a big problem for us because our opponents were already settled. We did not know who had the hot hand that affected us in attack and although we converted better at the line, it was not enough. Our decision-making was also a problem.”

Looking ahead to their next game, Captain Selina Okumu says the team needs to work on their kicking game and adopt a collective defense, arguing that the team had opted for individualism which did not help them as they tried to catch up with Uganda. “We could have done better as a team but there is room for improvement. This is only the first game.”

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The Ugandans who were minus their star player Jamila Nansikombi held firm and followed through with their game plan to frustrate and hurry their opponents.

In the previous two qualifiers, Kenya has dominated the Sudanese. In 2021,Kenya humbed SSD by a score total of 66-48 and two years later in 2023,Kenya went further to punish the Southern Sudanese by a score of 80-51.Kenya will be hopeful third time will be a charm so that they get into the business end of the Championship.

In another contest, hosts Egypt had an easy path thrashing Burundi by a score of 102-40. Raneem Elgedawy and Nadine Mohamed were the damagers in chief in the contest with each contributing 16 points in the first half alone. Burundi’s ball-handling was their biggest undoing as they were caught for lax with a whopping 42 turnovers to make the Pharaohs work easy.

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