Arizona center Oumar Ballo had 16 points and 13 rebounds for Mali, but it wasn't enough to save Mali from a 58-54 loss to Turkey on Tuesday in the FIBA U19 World Cup in Latvia.
Former UA wing Tibet Gorener, now of San Jose State, had nine points and three rebounds while hitting 2 of 3 3-pointers for Turkey.
After reaching the final of the U19 World Cup in 2019, Mali this time went winless in group play against USA, Turkey and Australia and will now face France (2-1) in round of 16 play Wednesday at 1:30 a.m. (Arizona/PDT is 10 hours behind Latvia).
Meanwhile, Ballo's UA teammates in the U19 World Cup, Azoulas Tubelis (Lithuania) and Bennedict Mathurin (Canada) had relatively easy days.
Mathurin had 13 points and six rebounds in Canada's 85-56 win over Senegal, while Tubelis had 15 points and three rebounds in just 17 minutes for Lithuania in its 95-63 win over Japan.
Lithuania (2-1) will open bracketed play Wednesday against Iran (1-2) at 5 a.m., while Canada (3-0) will face Puerto Rico (1-2) at 11 a.m.
