Tokyo Games: Australia Basketball team settle for 84-67 win over Nigeria’s D’Tigers

Promising Nigeria’s male Basketball team, D’Tigers lost to Australia in their opening duel of the Tokyo Olympic Games in Japan on Sunday.

It was only two weeks ago that a Boomers ‘B’ team – that rested its big four – were 39 points better than Nigeria in Las Vegas.

This time around, in Australia’s Olympic opener, head coach Brian Goorjian had to settle for an 84-67 win after a performance that was as promising as it was sloppy.

There was nothing pretty about the Group B clash inside the Saitama Super Arena, with the two teams combining for 46 turnovers – Australia contributing 22 of their own — in a game where the arena’s buzzer couldn’t even do its job properly.

Still, the Boomers did just enough as their defence — on which they’ve hung their hat — once again proved elite, while the offence mustered what was necessary to pull away late and get over the line.

Two nights after carrying the flag, Patty Mills again played national hero as he drained 25 points. Joe Ingles and Dante Exum were next best with 11 apiece as the Boomers held Nigeria to just 27 points in the second half.

Nigeria, a unit filled with NBA talent that stunned Team USA and Argentina in the lead-up to Tokyo, has built a system on long, multi-dimensional athletes who make things hard for the opposition on defence and push the pace on offence.

And they certainly made life difficult for the Australians as a messy 40 minutes of basketball saw the Boomers walk off the court knowing they’d been in a scrap.

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“[We] obviously didn’t play as well as we would have liked,” Mills said post-game. “[But] what we’re trying to do here is a team effort and everyone playing their part, and that’s what we did today.

“We talk about staying in the trenches together. That’s what this game was all about. This is what this whole tournament is going to be about.”

With Goorjian’s team entering the competition with defence their main focus, the Boomers got off to the perfect start; forcing 13 first-half turnovers. The only problem? Australia had 11 of their own.