Government Secondary School, Minna, Niger State on Tuesday emerged the male champions of the Nestle Milo Secondary School Basketball Championship zonal qualifier after defeating hard-fighting students of Joseph Secondary, School, Myiman, Benue State 26-24 points at the Akure Township Stadium, Ondo State.
Both teams had earlier met during the group stage with Benue State managing a 22-20 narrow win in their first match of the competition.
Led by inspirational captain, Yusuf Abdulbasit, who also emerged the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, the determined Niger boys lost the first quarters by 4-7 but came back stronger in the second quarter by winning 6-5 before winning the 3rd and 4th quarters 5-3 and 11-9 respectively.
Elated coach of the team, Solomon Abiodun Tanko, said: “We are proud of these boys because they played to instructions.
“We won because we worked on our inadequacies noticed when we lost to Benue in our first match.
“Our target is to improve because it is going to be very tough in Lagos.
In the girls’ category, Government Secondary School, Gboko, Benue State, made up for their male counterpart by defeating Queen Amina College, Kaduna State 34-22 to emerge champions of the Central Conference.
The match ended 9-0, 10-5, 12-6 and 12-11 in their favour.
Speaking after the final, Folorunsho Osho, Nestle Milo Brand Manager, praised the participating schools as well as the Ondo State Government for staging a successful competition.
Osho said: “We are proud to invest in these schools and youth development is our focus. Last year champions from Adamawa State went to represent Nigeria at an African Championship in South Africa where they also emerged champions. This is a great testimony to our commitment to basketball development in Nigeria.”
Atina Eucheria from Benue State emerged as the female MVP with Nasarawa State winning the Fair Play Award for the male and Plateau State winning the award in the female category.
All the four schools will represent the Central Conference at the finals as attention shifts to the Western Conference billed for May 9 to 15 at the Liberty Stadium, Ibadan Oyo State.
