U16 Belgian Lions remain undefeated and head to the Quarter-Finals!

At the U16 European Championship (B-Division) in Skopje our U16 Belgian Lions are on course to regain their spot in A-Division next summer by going undefeated in the Group Phase.

After huge victories against Portugal (52-82) and Hungary (84-57) our youngsters came up against a scrappy Bosnia & Herzegovina who proved to be their first real challenge. In a game that remained close throughout, our Lions remained cool-headed and eventually came away with the 7 point victory (76-83).

Next up came the also undefeated Switzerland in a clash for the top spot in Group A. True to form, Switzerland showed they have a very solid roster this summer as they were leading it at the half with the 28-35 advantage. Unphased our youngsters fought back in the second half under guidance by Tom Kasongo who has been providing instant offense coming off the bench. Headed into the final quarter our youngsters reduced the deficit to only 2 points (46-48). They kept their momentum in the opening minutes of the 4th quarter as they jumped over Switzerland, forcing them into a Time-Out. Throughout the remainder of the quarter both teams went back-and-forth until with 1 minute left in the game Ilias Van Hecke drained 2 consecutive threes to give us a 5 point cushion. In the remaining seconds Switzerland only scored 1 of 2 FT’s to establish the 65-61 final score.

On Thursday our youngsters will now have to face The Netherlands in the Quarter-Finals.

As expected our youngsters have so far been led by their Point Guard Aaron Ona Embo who in his second U16 European Championship is averaging 16.5 ppg, 3.5 rpg, 4.3 apg & 2.5 spg. Our second best performer is swingman Christian Elocobe with his averages of 9.3 ppg, 4.3 rpg, 2.3 apg, 2.5 spg & 1.8 bpg. Tom Kasongo is also performing at a very high level and despite only playing 12.8 mpg he’s second in scoring on our team with his 10.3 ppg, shooting a magnificent 68% from the field, while also adding 3.0 rpg & 1.3 bpg.