Mandy Juruni Archives | The Big Tip Off

Juruni enthusiastic about leading Rwanda’s Kepler

MANDY Juruni, the renowned Ugandan basketball coach, has made a name for himself as one of his country’s greatest coaches. His success at City Oilers recently led to him being lured away from a club he led for a better part of a decade.

As he helped build the Oilers into a Ugandan powerhouse, Juruni, who has won ten national league titles, also qualified the team twice for the continent’s premier club competition, The Basketball Africa League (BAL). However, he will not lead the Oilers to their second BAL appearance after he accepted a two-year deal to coach Kepler University, recently promoted to the premier division of the Rwanda Basketball League.

The surprising announcement of Juruni’s departure from the Oilers came after he helped the team punch their ticket to BAL Season 4 in Johannesburg in late November.

Mandy Juruni at the Road To BAL Elite 16 — **Mandy Juruni wants to build Kepler into a competitive team. Pictures: The BTO and FIBA**

Juruni, a five-time league winner with women’s team JKL Dolphins, reflected on his time with the Oilers, how The BAL has elevated basketball on the continent and his new position. The Road To BAL Elite 16 Division East tournament marked the end of Mandy Juruni’s journey with the Oilers, where he started as a player-coach and then transitioned to head coach.

While at the helm of the Ugandan giants, Juruni says he experienced a personal evolution. “Being a part of the club’s development for 10 years has been amazing, I have grown as a person and coach,” said Juruni. “Some of the players who came in with me in my first year have also grown and are a part of the team’s core.”

Being at the club for as long as he did, Juruni says leaving the Oilers was hard, but he expressed confidence that the club’s success will continue even without him at the helm.

“It was not an easy decision, but I am going to cherish all the good times I had with the club,” he said. “We achieved a lot, and I am proud to leave the club with the respect that it deserves, not only in Uganda but also in Africa. I do not doubt that they will continue to grow and continue to win.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Kepler HQ (@kepler_hq)

Juruni, a former head coach of Kyambogo Warriors, understands the value of The BAL for young athletes and clubs across the continent.
He says, “for an African kid playing back home, you are now playing for something. You will know that even if I do not make it to America or Europe, if I play hard with my club, there is The BAL to play for, and that is a good platform for young African athletes.”

Juruni turned the focus to his new club, Kepler and getting to coach in the new hub for basketball in Africa. He expressed his excitement at leading the promoted Kepler in their debut season.

Kepler will face tough competition from heavyweights such as Rwanda Energy Group (REG), The BBC Patriots, and champions APR BBC, the latter bound for this season’s Basketball Africa League (BAL). “I am excited to be here and coaching in Rwanda. They have a very good and competitive league. I am excited to be a part of that,” said Juruni.

Mandy Juruni at the BAL Nile Conference — **Mandy Juruni says he grew as a person and coach at the Oilers.**

He also outlined his mission at the university club. Juruni says he wants to work on the players’ attitude and enhance the club’s structures for the future.

“Kepler is a new entrant in the league, and there is a lot that we need to do to be competitive against the best in the country. One of the things I need to do is develop the program so that we can have a strong team,” said Juruni. “We have to work on the players’ confidence so they can believe in themselves… And that they can compete against the best in the country.

“My job here is to get a competitive team. One that we can build on. The players here are young, energetic and ambitious. I am optimistic that we will have a very good season.”

Juruni can be justified in having high hopes for the upcoming Rwandan season – his track record for building a team and delivering success speaks for itself. His enthusiasm for the job could also be the right tonic Kepler requires to one day be among Rwanda’s top teams.

Juruni enthusiastic about leading Rwanda’s Kepler Read More »

Juruni to add firepower to the Oilers ahead of BAL

Continuity is key for the Oilers

FOR Ugandan club, City Oilers, qualifying for the Basketball Africa League (BAL) seemed like a feat they could only dream of rather than realise. That was until last year.

In Johannesburg, South Africa, at the Elite 16 Road to BAL qualifiers (a round where they have twice fallen short), the Oilers finally put their past qualifying disappointments aside and lived up to their potential by making it to the third edition of one of Africa’s premier basketball competitions this year.

While there is a lot to cheer about on the success of the nine-time Ugandan National Basketball League champions, the team’s long-serving coach Mandy Juruni reflected on his team’s previous qualifying campaigns, which ended in disappointment, and he felt that had built up to this achievement.

“This has been a learning curve for us. In our first attempt (in 2019) in Rwanda, we got knocked out in the semi-finals by the host club, the Patriots. We also lost the third-place qualifying game against Ferroviario de Maputo,” said the decorated Juruni earlier in the year. “The second time (in 2021), we wanted to qualify, but we could not travel to South Africa due to Covid-19 restrictions.

“These were learning experiences for us as a group, and we cannot trade them away. We can only get better, and now when we head to the BAL, we want to go there and compete and not just make the numbers. We want to be a competitive unit.”

Preparations for the BAL (taking place in Dakar 11-21 March, Cairo 26 April-6 May and Kigali 21-27 May) have already begun for the Oilers, who beat Burundi’s Urunani in a third-place play-off game in Johannesburg to qualify for this year’s tournament.

“We have already started with our preparations. Right now, we are in the phase of organising our roster together. We are also putting plans in place to get us ready for the tournament,” said one of Uganda’s most successful club coaches.

**Oilers will look to retain the services of Germaine Roebuck Jr ahead of the BAL.**

In terms of the playing personnel, 40-year-old Juruni hopes to retain the services of American players Germain Roebuck Jr and Falando Cortez Jones. Roebuck Jr, who started the journey with the Oilers in preliminary qualifiers in Tanzania last year, and Cortez Jones were key points contributors to the Ugandan club’s cause.

Guard Roebuck Jr’s 21 points and 11 rebounds against Urunani in the third-place qualifier ensured that the Ugandan club qualified for their maiden BAL tournament. Guard/forward Cortez Jones had a memorable 40-point game in a semi-final loss to the Cape Town Tigers.

“They (Roebuck Jr and Cortez Jones) are a big part of our team and process. We are happy with what they did for us in the first and second rounds of the Road to BAL,” said Juruni. “What will be important for our team is to maintain the continuity put in place in the last round. We have built a team where players know each other, the system and the coach. So, we don’t want to change everything because we are going to the BAL.

“I think having continuity, improving as a team and certain positions is key for us.”

Apart from retaining the core of his squad and the two American star players, Juruni has also identified some positions that may need attention ahead of the BAL competition.

“We want to improve the team and have a roster that can compete at that level. We know we lacked a little bit of size at the forward position. At the five as well, we may need to add another big man,” said Juruni. “We need to improve on our scoring as well. Two players carried the load in South Africa, and at some point three. We need to be a team that has scoring options. We should not find ourselves in a situation where our top players play forty minutes of basketball.

“Like what Jones went through for us to compete against Cape Town. We need to improve our bench, and make sure there is enough firepower for us to compete at that level.”

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by City Oilers Basketball Club 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆 (@cityoilers)

With the BAL tournament just around the corner, the Oilers have also planned for the team to get much-needed match fitness.

“We plan to have a camp in Egypt. There are some friendly games in the pipeline. We are also trying to organise a regional tournament to get our locally-based players ready. And at the moment they are doing individual work, but next month we will come together for our camp,” concluded Juruni.

Juruni and the Oilers seem to have covered their bases ahead of Africa’s blue-ribbon club competition. As they continue their preparation for the BAL they will remind themselves what it took to get to this stage. When first jump ball of the league launches the Oilers will know they have finally arrived.

Juruni to add firepower to the Oilers ahead of BAL Read More »

Silverbacks eager to rub shoulders with Africa’s elite

Leave a Comment

FOR the Uganda national team players and coach Mandy Juruni, there has been little rest. Juruni and his players did not enjoy much of a festive season as they have been hard at work, in attempting to qualify for their third FIBA Afrobasket in a row.

The Silverbacks, as the Uganda basketball team is known, has experienced growth under the tutelage of Juruni, who assumed the coaching role in 2014. And since his appointment, Uganda qualified for the 2015 and 2017 editions of the tournament.

Uganda will hope the toil and sacrifice, will again result in a ticket to the marquee continental event in Rwanda (24 August-5 September).

Second Picture — **Uganda coach Mandy Juruni knows the task ahead is still difficult. Pictures: FIBA**

But before they can even think of the tournament itself, Uganda must negotiate their way through the qualification process. The Silverbacks head to Monastir, Tunisia for the second qualifying window (February 17-21), with a 3-2 record. They will have a measure of confidence after victories over group E opponents, Cape Verde and Morocco in the opening qualifying window, held in Egypt last year. The East African’s only loss came at the hands of the hosts.

As mentioned earlier, the reasoning for the extra work is that players need to remain motivated, as taking their eye off the ball can be costly. Another issue has also been the lack of action on the court, due to the global COVID-19 pandemic.

“As a technical team, we sat down after the first window and decided we are not taking a lot of time off. We wanted to keep the boys engaged as there has not been competitive basketball in Uganda because of the pandemic,” said the 38-year-old Juruni. “We started training in the third week of December. We had a few days off during the Christmas break and got right back at it on the first week of January. “

While the lack of competitive basketball is lamentable, and Uganda’s defeat against Egypt showed as much. Juruni, who has won a combined 12 league titles in the men’s and women’s local league, will be buoyed by the two victories his team notched.

“It’s been difficult because in basketball, to be in good game shape, you have to compete. Just training only is not good enough. You have to play games,” said Juruni, who reflected on their first round of qualifiers. “Definitely in the first window, it was difficult for us, we had not played a competitive match since March. Our first competitive game was against Egypt. We gave it our best. At the end of the third quarter, we were still in the game. In the fourth quarter, we ran out of steam and lost focus. But in our next games, because we had played before, we were much better.”

The talents of American-born small forward, Ishmail Wainright, shooting guard Robinson Opong and point guard Jimmy Enabu, have helped put the Silverbacks’ qualifying destiny in their own hands. The scoring feats of Wainright (21.3 points per game), Opong (19.0 points per game) and Enabu (17.7 points per game) have been crucial to Uganda’s campaign. A factor Juruni acknowledges, but he also indicated that it would take more than the scoring ability of the trio to make it to the Afrobasket.

We are happy with the performances of those three. But for us to succeed, we will need more than that. We need everyone in the team to contribute positively. We believe the team that we have can do that. So we want our best players to continue playing well. We want the other seven or eight players to come on board as well. The more we contribute individually, the better it is for the team,” said the former point guard.

Juruni has ensured that his team does not rest on its laurels. He is also aware that the job is half-done, and familiar foes with similar desires stand in their way. The physical education teacher is well-versed with the above scenario after Uganda dropped the ball attempting to qualify for a major tournament.

“Our goal is to qualify for the Afrobasket. I know that it is not going to come easy. We have to work for it; we have to respect our opponents because they are good basketball nations. We have been in a situation like this in the World Cup qualifiers. We don’t want to be comfortable because we won two games. We want to train hard and have the best preparation possible to have a better campaign in the second window,” said Juruni, who coaches local club City Oilers.

It has not been ideal preparation for Uganda, but they have faced the challenge head-on. They will need to be resilient, tenacious and make the most of the advantage they hold if they are to rub shoulders with the continents elite basketball nations again.

Silverbacks eager to rub shoulders with Africa’s elite Read More »