Nigeria, 15 others through to finals of 2025 Men’s AfroBasket Championship
By Olaolu Joseph
The list of countries that will compete for honors at the 31st edition of the Men’s AfroBasket Championship, Angola 2025, is now complete.
The qualifiers include hosts and 11-time African champions Angola, Egypt and Senegal, who each have five titles, three-time winners Tunisia, and Côte d’Ivoire, which has won the tournament twice. These teams will compete in the finals later this year.
Nigeria—the 2015 champions—bounced back from a 0-3 start in the first qualifying window to secure their place in the Angolan capital with a series of tantalizing, scintillating, and mesmerizing performances against Libya and Uganda, including a dead rubber match for pride and ranking against Cape Verde.
The team that finishes fourth in Group B will qualify as the best fourth-placed team of the AfroBasket Qualifiers, meaning all teams in that group will be in Luanda.
Rwanda, South Sudan, and Uganda are the flag bearers from East Africa. Rwanda punched their ticket to the finals with an 81-71 win over a hapless Gabon on the final day of qualifiers.
Similarly, Guinea joined the teams heading to Angola with a 13-point victory over Kenya, which had missed its first game of the final window against Tunisia due to flight difficulties.
Shannon Evans and Ousmane Drame were unstoppable as Guinea secured a crucial victory over Kenya to book their spot at the August 2025 AfroBasket.
Both teams entered the match needing a win to qualify, and coach Nedeljko Asceric’s men proved superior, securing a 57-44 victory to reach their third consecutive AfroBasket tournament.
Evans and Drame scored 20 and 19 points, respectively, with Drame completing a double-double with 10 rebounds in just over 31 minutes. Guinea finished third with eight points, two more than the Kenya Morans, who forfeited their opening match of the final qualifying window against defending champions Tunisia.
Madagascar, Mali, Cameroon, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Cape Verde, and Libya complete the lineup for what promises to be an exciting, intense, and competitive tournament.
Former winners Central African Republic and Morocco failed to qualify from Groups D and A, respectively.
A breakdown of the 16 finalists shows that West Africa leads with six teams, followed by three teams each from North and East Africa, and two each from Central and Southern Africa.
West – 6 Countries
★ Cape Verde
★ Côte d’Ivoire – 2-time champions
★ Guinea
★ Mali
★ Nigeria – 1 title
★ Senegal – 5-time winners
East – 3 Countries
★ Rwanda
★ South Sudan
★ Uganda
North – 3 Countries
★ Egypt – 5-time winners
★ Libya
★ Tunisia – 3-time winners
Central – 2 Countries
★ Cameroon
★ Democratic Republic of Congo
South – 2 Countries
★ Angola – Host and 11-time winners
★ Madagascar
The FIBA Men’s AfroBasket 2025 will be the 31st edition of Africa’s premier men’s basketball championship.
The tournament will take place in Luanda, the Angolan capital, from August 12 to 24, 2025. Angola has previously hosted the event in 1989, 1999, and 2007.
Tunisia won the last two editions of the tournament, triumphing on home soil in 2017 before lifting their third AfroBasket trophy in 2021 in Kigali, Rwanda.
