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By gwg.ng
Nigerians have taken to popular microblogging site, social media to excoriate, Stephen Smith, over his condescending remarks following the nation’s basketball team, D’Tigers’ victory over the USA basketball team.
Smith is an American sports television personality, sports radio host, and sports journalist who also works as a commentator on ESPN’s First Take, where he appears with Max Kellerman and Molly Qerim.
Trouble ensued after the Nigerian team scored an incredible 20 three-pointers and took control of the game.
At a point, the team was leading the Americans, who are rated fourth globally, by 24 points.
Nigeria eventually upset Team USA 90-87 in Las Vegas that Saturday night.
As reported by Yahoo Sports, “The American men’s team — headlined by NBA stars such as Kevin Durant, Damian Lillard and Bradley Beal — fell 90-87 to Nigeria in its first of five exhibition games before the Olympics in Tokyo.”
And, while the American team featured NBA All-Stars throughout its rotation, Nigeria had the likes of Precious Achiuwa and Gabe Vincent of the Miami Heat and Chimezie Metu of the Sacramento Kings, all headlined by former Cleveland Cavaliers and Los Angeles Lakers head coach Mike Brown.
Nigeria rode a torrent of 3-pointers to victory, making 20 attempts from deep to shock the overwhelming gold medal favorites.
It may be recalled that when the Americans met Nigeria nine years ago, it was a 156-73 USA win. The Saturday encounter was therefore stunningly shocking for pundits who had expected the match to be a stroll in the park for the American team.
Reacting to the outcome, Smith blurted in his widely circulated video embedded here: “[To lose to] some dude Gabe Nnamdi, who goes by Gabe Vincent for the Miami Heat. Or Caleb Agada. Or Nma … however the hell you pronounce his name…”
However, Smith comments drew the ire of Nigerians on Twitter who took turns to lampoon the African-American on air personality.
See the video containing the name butchering as posted by Stephen A Smith via his own verified Twitter handle @stephenasmith:
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