Basketball New South Wales held their annual awards on the 8th of December, 2019 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.
Long Service Award:
Basketball New South is excited to announce the 2019 Annual Award Winners of the Long Service Award.
This particular award is presented to individuals for the service within the basketball community over an extended period of time.
We would formally like to acknowledge and congratulate the following individuals.
Paul Healy – Taree Basketball Association
Paul Healy arrived in Taree in the late 80’s and straight away he was knocking on the door of Taree Basketball Association to be involved, and that continues today.
Paul has seen the highs and the lows of the sport in the Taree area, from having three imports playing the State League, the ladies won it, to being the only person standing to keep the association going. When asked,” Why do you do what you do for basketball?”. His answer is, “ Someone did it for me and I just wanted to play, so l will do it for others.”
Taree’s stadium is unique as it was one of the last stadiums to be built, that is owned by the association so that in itself is a challenge. Apart from running basketball competitions, a building had to be run and maintained plus balancing the books. Not short of a challenge Paul continued on with a small band of people, and over a period of years the association continued. Not reaching great heights but continued. As time moved on the association grew slowly and continued in the NJL, not having the great success of years before but competing. Competing for small association was a success in itself.
Now fast forward to 2019 the Taree Tornadoes are riding the height of the wave again, players gaining higher recognition and selection, to the association being seen as a leader in the future of the game. Paul is still in the thick of things, from being on court with our Coaching Director to locking the stadium door at night.
Taree has been very fortunate to have someone with a passion for the game and the desire to see youth have a good start in life be the backbone of their association for so many years.
Vik Kortian – Norths Basketball Association
Vik Kortian has been President of Norths since 2016. Prior to this, he was the Vice President, after beginning as a director. Vik holds a PHD in Business Administration, as well as a MBA, and lectures on Business Excellence at one of Sydney’s leading university’s business schools.
He uses his expertise to assist Norths in all aspects of its operations.
Vik also referees several times a week and plays three times a week. He is also a member of the Homenetmen International Board, representing Australia and volunteers for a number of other organisations.
Vik attends many meetings with various politicians from all levels of government, working to get their support to build more courts to cater with the huge demand. He has volunteered to assist other associations with their strategic planning processes. For his many hours of dedicated work, Vik is a worthy award recipient.
Dhana Davidson – Newcastle Basketball
Dhana Davidson has been involved with Newcastle for many years. She was initially involved as a parent but quickly took on roles as team manager for several teams within the association.
This year she was manager of Newcastle’s U18 Women and Youth League Women teams, and played an important role in the background as both teams went on to win State Championships.
She has also actively continued to share her time within the wider BNSW community as manager on numerous BNSW Country Tours and representative teams. Dhana is one of those selfless people who are always happy to put up their hand and do whatever is required to help out. Dhana is a worthy award recipient and someone that will always put the development of young athletes first.
Jill Marjoram – Lithgow Basketball Association
Jill started her involvement with Lithgow basketball about 30 years ago when her boys started playing in the local competition. Even though she didn’t have a background in the sport, she was always one of the first people to put her hand up for scoring and fundraising. This evolved over time as her boys fell in love with the game and throughout the early years saw her as an active member on Junior association and Lithgow Lazers committees, and manager of teams – stepping into any void that needed to be filled which often happens in small associations. Jill also became a level 2 bench official often stepping in on games at representative rounds even when Lithgow wasn’t involved.
She also continued assisting the association in any form she could even when her own children stopped playing by driving members across the state when their own parents were unable to and being on hand every weekend during competitions. This has continued right up until the current day with her still giving up her weekends to travel for junior and senior Lazers and help out where she can.
One of her biggest contributions to Lithgow basketball was a few years ago, with Lithgow basketball at a major crossroads with numbers dwindling and a severe lack of back of house systems in place to comply with current standards, plus a new committee Jill took it upon herself to bring the back of house up to modern standards. As a lot of people can appreciate this was not an easy job for a single person, but something she has worked tirelessly and has allowed the association to grow into a very successful organisation for such a small town.
It should be noted that this has been done on top of being a mother of two and a full-time worker with a high-pressure job in NSW health.
On behalf of Basketball NSW, congratulations to all our award recipients.
CLICK HERE for Photo Gallery (Credit Nigel Owen )