Bush Wamukota led Cobra Sport of South Sudan to a 77-67 win over Ulinzi Warriors in their Africa Basketball League (BAL) Elite 16 campaign at the Wembley Arena in Johannesburg, South Africa Wednesday.
The towering Kenya Morans centre signed from Patriots of Rwanda, sunk 21 points, and pulled down 11 rebounds.
He also went three of five from the three-point arc to cement the win.
The soldiers playing in the Division East Group H1 match controlled the rebounds but trailed 36-28 before two late efforts by captain Eric Mutoro and Tiberius Menya reduced the margin to 36-32 at the break.
After the resumption, Cobra Sport were ignited by two three-point shots by Wamukota that pushed the scores to 50-32.
But the never say die Ulinzi cut the margin on Philip Bwire and Mutoro threes to reduce the deficit to 57-52 at the end of the third stanza.
In the last quarter, they again got off to a 61-56 cushion on a dunk by Wamukota and then banked another three for a 66-55 margin with 5:38 played. Cobra Sport's new signing Nzie collected a tournament-high of 32 points for the South Sudanese who lost to Ulinzi in the qualifiers in Tanzania last month.
Mutoro sunk 16 points for the Kenyan champions, William Otieno had 14 with Tiberius Menya scoring another 11 for the Warriors.
Ulinzi play their second game against the favourites Mozambican Ferroviaro de Beira, who blanked Cobra 76-46 on Thursday.
In the Division West Group H2 encounter, Cape Town Tigers dismissed Matero Magic of Zambia 83-77 but fell 83-71 to New Star of Burundi
A total of 12 teams instead of 16 are taking part in the championships that end on Saturday.
The top six teams from the South African tourney will qualify for the finals. Already clubs from Egypt, Tunisia, Angola, Nigeria, Senegal, and Rwanda are in the finals.
