Rwanda national basketball regular season league champions Rwanda Energy Group (REG) have already begun preparations ahead of the 2017/18 season by beefing up their rosters with new players. The start of the new campaign, which is scheduled to get underway on December 1, will be preceded by the pre-season tournament that will run from November 11-26. Jean Bahufite’s REG have signed two players from playoffs champions, Patriots, including Elie Kaje—the 22-year-old forward penned a two-year contract. He follows the capture of shooting guard Junior Walter Nkurunziza last month. Former Espoir player Kaje, and Nkurunziza, both Rwandan internationals, will be of high importance to REG’s ambitions of becoming Rwanda’s dominant basketball club. The duo also helped Patriots to win the Genocide Memorial Tournament in 2016 as well as second place at this year’s FIBA Africa Zone V Club Championship held last month in Kampala, Uganda. Kaje was part of Espoir team that had dominated Rwandan basketball from 2012 to 2015 because the emergency of Patriots. editorial@newtimes.co.rw
