Basketball New South Wales held their annual awards on the 18th of November, 2018 at Qudos Bank Arena during the WNBL & NBL double header featuring the Sydney Uni Flames & Sydney Kings. BNSW would like to congratulate all nominees and award recipients on their achievements and for joining us to celebrate.
State Team of the Year:
Basketball New South Wales is pleased to announce our 2018 State Team of the Year. This year New South Wales were represented in the form of fourteen teams, in the following age groups/divisions;
NSW U20 Men
NSW U20 Women
NSW Metro Ivor Burge Women
NSW Country Ivor Burge Women
NSW Ivor Burge Men
NSW U18 Metropolitan Men
NSW U18 Country Men
NSW U18 Metropolitan Women
NSW U18 Country Women
NSW Kevin Coombs Mixed Team
NSW U16 Metropolitan Men
NSW U16 Country Men
NSW U16 Metropolitan Women
NSW U16 Country Women
The 2018 State Team of the Team of the Year is the NSW Metro U16 Boys team, the side was coached by Will Lopez, and assisted by Jarrod Moore & Tedi Yaghoubian and managed by Carolyn Bennett
This year’s U16 Men’s NSW Metro State Team proved to be one of the most talented groups NSW Metro has had since their last medal in 2014. The Coaching and Support Staff ensured the athletes had an unbelievable experience on and off the court. These 10 young athletes represented their families, associations, and NSW with pride and returned home with a well-deserved Bronze medal.
Several of these athletes had a breakout tournament and were offered a National Performance Program Scholarship, Australian Development Camp invites and Australian U15 team selections.
George Thompson Memorial Award:
The George Thompson Memorial Award is a recognition award for outstanding contribution to women’s basketball. Open criteria to recognise the outstanding efforts of an Individual and a team, and or association and/or organisation’s to women’s basketball. Fittingly, the George Thompson Memorial Award for Outstanding Contribution to Women’s basketball in NSW is named in his honor.
Congratulations to Manly Warringah Basketball Association on being the of the George Thompson Memorial Award.
MWBA have continued to strengthen their girls programs since 2012 by adding the introduction of many key initiatives such as pink ball, girls only learning leagues, girls only mini ball and the allocation of the most experienced coaches to the girls U12 & U14 girls age groups. This has lead to MWBA to be successful in many MJL Championships, several awards, U14 Girls nationals and athletes to be selected in State programs/teams as the first group of U12 girls from the first year, have now reached the U18’s age group.
Chairman’s Award:
This award recognises the Association of the Year. Congratulations to City of Sydney Basketball Association. City of Sydney BA is celebrating 50 years of basketball in eastern Sydney this year. The association has a great success with both juniors and seniors over many years, but especially with their juniors programs in the last 5 years with U14, U16 and U18 boys all being state champions in 2018. The U14 teams have also seen great success at the Nationals with medals in the last 3 years. At grass roots the associations runs domestic programs for all age groups and pro-actively working to include EBL teams in their competitions. With two more courts coming on line in the next 6 months and two more building projects in the planning Comets are building to expand their footprint and for kids to play basketball in the city of Sydney and the Eastern suburbs.
Congratulations to Ben, Paul and the staff and Andrew and Board for doing a great job for basketball!
Dr. John Rashke Award:
This award acknowledges the outstanding achievements by an individual to develop the game of basketball.Basketball New South Wales would like to congratulate Albert Joseph & Leeanne Palmer on being awarded the Dr John Rashke Award for 2018.
In this time Albert Joseph he has been a coach, referee, instructor, educator, scoretable personnel , referee coach program manager and has also assisted in the governance area within BNSW. He also currently sits on the Waratah Advisory Committee for BNSW.
Alby has also worked tirelessly for FIBA in his role as FIBA Oceania Referee Manager. Alby works closely with FIBA in the area of ongoing education and improvement of all aspects of officiating, strategically as well as a practical hands on approach at many events – elite and grass roots.
Alby has worked in the Basketball Australia space as a long term Technical Commissioner for AJC’s and instructor on the WNBL, and was also the Referee Manager for the NBL for the 2015/2016 season. Alby has also greatly contributed in the BA landscape at a development and strategic level and has worked tirelessly to continue to develop the game on all levels. Congratulations Alby on your award.
Leeanne Palmer has been involved in Domestic, State and National Basketball in various roles since the 1980’s. She is a caring, dedicated and sincere person who gives 100% of her effort to Basketball in this State, while at the same time coping with her own personal situations.
Leeanne Palmer was a tennis player when she was younger but was drawn into basketball in 1988 when her son Daniel started playing for Newcastle. She was on the Newcastle junior representative committee for many years, long after Dan had finished playing. She was the manager for numerous NSW Country junior teams at Australian Junior Championships, has been involved with Country Tour to Albury for more than 30 years and on the Country Committee for 30 years.
Leeanne is Life Member of Newcastle Basketball and Basketball NSW. Her enthusiasm to help in all areas of basketball ensures organisation, structure and development is instrumental. Leanne brings a lot of interpersonal skills to basketball that makes volunteers feel welcome and of value.
Leeanne is Mrs Country Basketball and a well recipient of this award.
On behalf of Basketball NSW, congratulations to all our award recipients.
CLICK HERE for Photo Gallery (Credit Narelle Spangher)