If you are a fan of Namuwongo Blazers, there is every reason that you are still celebrating knocking City Oilers off a perch they owned for 10 completed National Basketball League seasons.
Call yourself a champion every day. It is worth it. Beating City Oilers in four straight games for a 4-2 final series victory was worth every decibel at the Lugogo Indoor Arena.
However, the team and players must have moved on by now. They ought to. There is bigger fish to fry in trying to get to Africa’s premier competition – the Basketball Africa League (BAL).
The BAL is the premier men’s basketball competition in Africa founded in 2019 by the NBA and Fiba. It attracts 12 teams from different countries and only City Oilers has represented Uganda thus far.
Predictably, City Oilers are the only Ugandan side to have played at this stage – having played in the Road to BAL four times, qualifying in 2023 and 2024.
This has always been the goal, the dream, and the ultimate. In fact, while unveiling one of their sponsors, Britam Insurance, on March 4, 2024, the club president George Nkya reminded us of that ambition.
‘Our ambitions are set quite high. I said this last year when we were beginning the league that our goal has been BAL and we have chosen our partners very carefully,’Nkya told the media.
Boxes have been ticked since then and Blazers are in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, for the Road To BAL East Division Elite 16 tournament at the Moi International Sports Center in Kasarani from Tuesday to Sunday.
To match the occasion, the Blazers have beefed up their roster from the zonal qualifiers. Point guard Jovan Mooring has joined having played for South African side Made By Ball last season.
Senegalese center Mohammed Sidy Djitte is also in alongside wing Jaycson BeReal. The top two teams from the tournament in Nairobi will qualify for the BAL finals in Kigali, Rwanda.
Hosts Nairobi City Thunder will start as favourites while the second slot could be a tossup.
Road to BAL – Elite 16
Fixtures
Tuesday: Blazers vs. Nairobi, 6pm
Tomorrow: J. Giants vs. Blazers, 6pm