Our U16 girls have won their first game at the European Challenger. The team won 57:46 against Ireland.
Faith Ehi Etute scored 24 points and grabbed 21 rebounds to lead team Luxembourg.
analysis by the coaching staff:
Luxembourg wins their last game against an uncomfortable Irish team.
Like in the previous game, Luxembourg had a good start and was able to get an early lead. Unfortunately, the team did not play consistently enough to increase their margin. The game was close for a long period and at the break, team Luxembourg had a 31-26 lead. In the third quarter, with alternating defenses, the girls tried to put the Irish girls out of their stride. After taking the lead, the girls kept on fighting to secure a well-deserved victory.
All in all, the Challenger tournament – which replaced the European Championship – was a very good and important first experience for the players. In comparison with the other countries, one could see that the girls from Luxembourg hadn’t played a regular season and hadn’t had the opportunity to compete in games.
Even though as a coach one can never be satisfied, the girls deserve credit. Over and over again the team played a tremendous defense with a lot of effort and in offense, they were able to have some unselfish nice combinations. On and off the court, they showed great team spirit and were very disciplined.
If the players had had a regular season in Luxembourg, it would have been possible to win a few more games. The girls will certainly benefit from this Challenger tournament in the upcoming years.
After the last game, Ehi Etute was named MVP of the tournament: with 20 points, 20 rebounds, and 4 assists per game, she was the pillar of the team. She was by far the most efficient player (32,6 EFF) of all the Challenger Tournaments combined (Kateryna Koval from Ukraine came second with an efficiency of 26,4).
game stats and pictures –> boxscore and pictures
Ehi Etute was named MVP of the Challenger –> Faith Ehi Etute named MVP at European Challenger (video)
