By: Kayiira Jackson
The emerse growth of Basketball 3*3 in Uganda has attracted one of the big beverage brand to inject cash in the invented new tournament.
Mountain Dew, one of the selling brands of Crown Beverages Uganda in conjunction with Red Rhino and FUBA have launched the new 3*3 tournament dubbed Mountain Dew 3*3 Series that will go nationwide.
The championship that will go in six different cities in Uganda and is slated to tee off on Saturday 19th October 2024.
While launching the tournament at the press conference held on Thursday at Kati Kati Restaurant, Mountain Dew Brand Manager, Namutebi Grace asserted that they are excited to be part of the tournament since it has their target audience of 25 years and below.
“…the 3*3 Series is a grassroot level in basketball and that is in line with our target audience, that’s 25 years and below and it’s our focus audience. ” Namutebi Grace stated.
Mountain Dew sponsorship is in millions of money and Grace revealed the breakdown of the deal.
“Our sponsorship consists of tournament setup costs, Players’ vests, basketballs, trophies, certificates, water throughout the games as well as a lot of entertainment for the fans.” She said.
Red Rhino Sports Director, Akwech Samuel stated that they are pleased to bring another tournament that provides platform to athletes to showcase their skills as well as winning cash.
“This has been in the world for some time and we are very excited as an agency to provide athletes yet another platform to develop and showcase their skills.” He said.
Federation of Uganda Basketball Association (FUBA) was represented by the 3*3 director, Hamza Nyabongo who has also welcomed the development citing that it will help the sport to grow.
“FIBA and FUBA have a long identified 3*3 as one of the ways to grow the game of basketball in Uganda.” Nyabongo stated before thanking the sponsor. “We are therefore excited to have Red Rhino Sports and Mountain Dew on board to help grow a s advance this variation of the sport and we believe that it can help us grow the sport and we can even qualify for the next Olympics with even more activities such as these.”
The Mountain Dew 3*3 will have 7 qualifying stops in six cities across Uganda and each stop shall act as a qualifier for the grand finale slated take place on Saturday 7th December 2024 in Kampala.
The grand finale shall need 24 teams, 12 female and twelve male teams with the winner of each category shall walk away with two million shillings prize cash.
However, the winner of each stop in both men and women shall take home 400,000/- and the runners up settle for 200,000/-.
According to organizers, the tournament needs players of 25 years and below, each team to have a maximum of two top flight players, a maximum of two foreign players and the registration go at 20,000/-.
Each city shall qualify one team apart from Kampala and Mukono that will qualify three each.
The first circuit in Kampala shall be hosted at Makerere Pool Court.
The program for the series.
Kampala: Saturday 19th October 2024
Mbarara City: Saturday 26th October 2024
Kampala : Saturday 2nd November 2024
Gulu City: Saturday 19th November 2024
Mukono : Saturday 16th November 2024
Mbale: Saturday 23rd November 2024
Jinja City: Saturday 30th November 2024
Final – Kampala: Saturday 7th December 2024.
