The 2013 FIBA Africa Championship tournament concluded Saturday afternoon, sending three teams to next year’s FIBA World Cup and thereby one step closer to the 2016 Olympics. Finalists Egypt and Angola already earned bids to next year’s Olympic qualifier while Senegal needed a late comeback to clinch the continent’s third and final World Cup bid.
All three teams are rather surprising considering Africa’s representatives at next year’s Worlds were expected to be the hosting Ivory coast squad along with Nigeria and Tunisia -- Africa’s two representatives at last year’s Olympics. Those three teams will now have to hope for a wild card bid, however, just to get back into the Olympic conversation.
Saturday afternoon’s championship game wasn’t much of a contest as Angola sailed to an easy 57-40 victory over Egypt after holding the upstart squad to just 28 points through the first three quarters. That ended Egypt’s Cinderella dream of winning the FIBA Africa contest -- they lost every one of their pool-play games before upsetting Tunisia and Senegal in the knockout tournament -- but a surprise bid in next year’s world cup should make their country proud.
Angola was led by 21 points from Carlos Morais while Eduardo Mingas and Reggie Moore -- a former Oral Roberts standout -- each contributed double-digit scoring efforts as well. Egypt’s only player to score in double figures was Sheriff Abdalla, a 34-year-old who scored 15 points on 16 shots.
Saturday’s more exciting game happened in the third-place game, perhaps because there was a bit more intrigue due to it deciding the final qualifying spot and moving one team that much closer to a potential Olympic bid. The team with more former NBA talent won as Senegal eked out a 57-56 victory, but the host team didn’t make it easy.
The game was close throughout the fourth quarter, but a huge three-pointer from Senegal’s Mamadou NDoye (he banked in a heave while getting fouled, eventually converting the four-point play) allowed Senegal to clinch Africa’s final spot in next year’s World Cup. Ndoye didn’t have much help from his team’s former NBA players as big men Hamady Ndiaye and Saer Sene combined for just 10 points and eight rebounds. 22-year-old Mohamed Diop was Senegal’s only player with double-digit points, scoring 11 after being held to just nine total points through the team’s first five games.