Basketball Africa League: Holders Zamalek progress to semi-finals
- Published
Zamalek head into the BAL semi-finals on Wednesday with a perfect record in the competition
Defending champions Zamalek booked their place in the Basketball Africa League play-off semi-finals as three sides from the Nile Conference won their last-eight ties in Rwanda over the weekend.
Zamalek beat Guinean outfit Seydou Legacy Athletique Club (SLAC) 66-49 in Kigali on Sunday, and the Egyptian club have now won all 12 of their matches in the competition's history.
However, coach Will Voigt says his side have room to improve despite continuing the unblemished record from their conference matches in Cairo last month.
"We hadn't played a competitive game in almost a month and a lot of the rust was probably due to that," American Voigt told BBC Sport Africa.
"We didn't shoot the ball as well as we would have liked."
Elsewhere Cameroon's Forces Armees et Police (FAP) upset hosts Rwanda Energy Group 66-63, while US Monastir and Petro de Luanda both progressed from their ties.
Tunisia's US Monastir defeated South Africa's Cape Town Tigers 106-67 and Angolan side Petro saw off AS Sale of Morocco 102-89.
Zamalek will face US Monastir, who they beat in the BAL final last year to win the inaugural title, in the semi-finals on Wednesday after Petro take on FAP.
Monastir are the only side from the Sahara Conference - which was played in March, a month before the Nile Conference - to reach the last four.
"Monastir are a really good team. They are really organised and have a team that has been playing together for a while," Voigt said.
"They just won the Tunisian championship and execute their offence really well.
"It's going to be a really hard game for us. The four teams in the semi-finals are all very tough, and anyone has a chance of winning it."
BAL 2022 play-off schedule
Quarter-finals:
REG (Rwanda) 63-66 FAP (Cameroon)
AS Sale (Morocco) 89-102 Petro Atletico (Angola)
Zamalek (Egypt) 66-49 SLAC (Guinea)
Cape Town Tigers (South Africa) 67-106 US Monastir (Tunisia)
Semi-finals:
Petro de Luanda v FAP - Wednesday, 25 May (1600 GMT).
US Monastir v Zamalek - Wednesday, 25 May (1930 GMT).
Third-place play-off: Friday, 27 May (1600 GMT).
Final: Saturday, 28 May (1600 GMT).