Basketball in Africa

Sunday
UGB    45-89     IPRC-South
BIENVENU Niyonsaba scored league career high of 34 points to inspire IPRC-South to an 89-45 win over United Generation Basketball Club in their first national basketball league game played on Sunday at Amahoro indoor stadium.
Fresh from winning the pre-season tournament, IPRC-South get off to a promising start, and their dominant win against UGB, will certainly send warning notice to their rivals.
IPRC-South narrowly took the first quarter 16-15 before dominating the second quarter 21-9 to go into half-time with a 37-24 lead. In-form IPRC also went on to claim last two quarters 20-15, 32-6.
The 20-year old small forward Niyonsaba, who also scored 35 points to lead IPRC- South to their maiden inter-universities championship three weeks ago, combined with point-guard Didier Ishimwe (15 points) to score a total of 49 points for Didier Bineza’s youthful side.
Jean Luc Ngirinshuti and Richard Niyomugabo scored 19 and 14 points respectively for UGB.
“Well done to my men, this is a wonderful job. Niyonsaba was on clinical form today, every player gave it all for the win,” a visibly excited IPRC-South coach Bineza said in a post-game interview with Times Sport.
Meanwhile, the game between IPRC-Kigali and Rusizi was postponed on the request from the latter club, which cited financial constraints for their failure to travel to Kigali for the game.
On Saturday, defending champions Espoir started the quest for a record fifth consecutive title, seeing off UR- College of Arts and Social Sciences (UR- CASS), coached by Charles Mushumba 89-67.