The second edition of the Bullet Basketball Tournament ended in Lagos on Sunday with Kwara Falcons and First Bank emerging the winners of the men and women category respectively.
The Kwara Falcons who were trailing with 8 points with less than two minutes to go recovered well to beat War Lords 69-67. First Bank had to bend backwards to overcome the MFM ladies 52-50. Both games gave the spectators first class entertainment with the winners emerging just before the buzzer.
The Elephant Girls took the first quarter 13-4 but the praying ladies from the MFM Mountains recovered to win the second quarter 22-14. National champion, First Bank took the third at 13-8 and MFM rallied to win the last 16-12 but their poor start meant they could not catch up with the Bankers at the end.
A day before the match, MFM coach, Ochuko Owolabi had said her ladies could beat First Bank if only they were able to overcome fear tied around the historical achievements of First Bank.
In the men’s event, Falcons had to throw in all they had in their reserves to beat a younger side. They rounded off the Bullet Tournament powered by the Sam Oguche Foundation with the trophy to start the NBBF Final-8 playoffs on Monday in Lagos.
Coach of the War Lords, Akindele Peter said the inexperience of his players took a sad toll on them.
“An experienced group would never have lost the game. We had it tied up but the young players became too excited and began to play in response to the cheers from the crowd. They got carried away and we paid dearly for it. This one (pointing to a player) is preparing to write his SS6 exams and that gives an idea of his age,” Akindele said.
And like teenagers who had never been to the warfront the War Lords players lost their composure and watered the floor of the Sports Hall with buckets of tears. They would have cried less if it was a team that had always beaten them but they had beaten the Falcons at the group stage and were leading with two minutes left before the roof came crashing on them. The champions got N1 million cash.