Patriots BC goes in the book as the first team to win a Basketball Africa League, BAL game.
Rwanda’s Patriots BC win the first game of the inaugural Basketball Africa League in the game the famous American rapper, J.Cole made his pro basketball debut.
Patriots that had an unbeaten record in the 2 rounds of Qualifiers, started the inaugural Basketball Africa League games on a high note, beating the Nigerian giants, Rivers Hoopers 83-60 in an eye-catching game that was a mixture of talent showcase and entertainment.
In the first quarter, Rwanda’s Pride, Patriots trailed Rivers Hoopers 18-17 but quickly turned things around in the three first minutes of the second quarter by making a 13-0 run. At this time, the host Patriots took control of the game with the help of Kigali Arena’s crowd. At the break, the Rwandan side was leading with a 9 points difference. 43-34
In the last two quarters of the game, the home side had nothing rather than consolidate the victory through their rich Squad. 22-10, 18-16 to make it 83-60 at the full time.
In this game, 38.5% of the Patriots’ points were from the bench while their opponent’s bench managed to score 28% of 60 points scored in the whole game. Nigerian side, Rivers Hoopers’ biggest lead was 8 points in the first quarter while the Patriots’ biggest lead was 29 points.
Patriots’ new addition and Rwanda National team center, Prince Ibeh, in 24 minutes played, contributed 11 points, 11 rebounds, and 3 blocked shots in the winning cause. Patriots’ Brandon Costner’s 20-point performance earned him a player of the Game award.
In this Basketball Africa League opening game, the American rapper, Jermaine Lamarr Cole ‘J. Cole’ who released his latest album The “Off-Season” on Friday, May 14, 2021, while he was in camp with Patriots, played his first Profession basketball game as he has never ceased to express his love for this game. As a reminder, this famous rapper is not new in Basketball as he was a star basketball player at Sanford High School and St. John’s University. Last year, J. Cole got a tryout offer from the NBA side, Detroit Pistons.
The Basketball Africa League games continue this Monday as Senegal’s AS Douanes plays Algerian’s GS Petrolies in the early first game before Zamalek faces Ferroviario de Maputo then we end the day with another entertaining game of Group A, US Monastir vs GNBC.
