GPS scorecard: Which Brisbane school comes out on top with ultimate bragging rights
Rugby, rowing, cricket and more: The Queensland schools with the best sporting records this century are revealed. INTERACTIVE RANKINGS
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It’s Queensland’s most elite schoolboy competition where first team players – treated like rock stars – do battle in must-win showdowns that shape the next generation of Australian sporting stars.
A Courier-Mail analysis across the prestigious Great Public Schools Association’s eight major sports has revealed the schools with the best record this century.
The analysis of nine GPS schools across the key sports of athletics (track and field), basketball, cricket, football, rowing (Old Boy’s Cup), rugby, sailing, and swimming found since 2000, bragging rights have been shared by two titans – St Joseph’s Nudgee College (Nudgee) and The Southport School (TSS).
Each have claimed 45 premierships up to the conclusion of the 2023 season.
It means whichever school between Nudgee and TSS comes out on top in the current season of GPS competition, will be the leading sporting school of the 21st century across those sports.
Taking in the current season, TSS has edged ahead in the overall standings after collecting the cricket and rowing premierships this year.
In the other premierships that have been awarded this year, Anglican Church Grammar School (Churchie) has secured the football premiership for the 2024 season, with Brisbane Grammar School (BGS) taking out the swimming championship for 2024.
Premierships are yet to be determined in key sports such as athletics (track and field), basketball, and rugby for 2024.
The overall GPS competition consists of 13 sports and activities including athletics (track and field), basketball, chess, cross country, debating, football, gymnastics, rowing, rugby, sailing, swimming, tennis, and volleyball, with records dating back to 1915, preceding the establishment of the GPS association itself in 1918.
The competition is steeped in history with over a century of names listed on the honour boards of each respective school, with it a source of pride for students and alumni to point out their names and stake their claim as being part of a premiership-winning team.
In the present day, rivalries are as competitive as ever, as schools bid for the services of top coaches, while seeking to attract the best emerging sporting talent with state-of-the-art facilities.
Nudgee’s headmaster Scott Thomson said the school has a rich sporting history and prides itself on its many achievements throughout its 134 years.
“We are appreciative of our place amongst the Queensland GPS organisation and relish the competitive nature and spirit of fellowship that comes with being a member school,” Mr Thomson said.
“Currently, we aim to establish quality programs across all GPS activities by ensuring the highest quality of coaches, standards, and facilities.
“Our first team coaches impress upon the boys the importance of being a quality person first, and quality athlete second.
“Humility in victory and grace in defeat.”
TSS headmaster Andrew Hawkins said the school is proud of its record of achievement in the GPS competition.
“The GPS competition is very unique in that it provides such a short window of high-level challenge for each sport, meaning you have to be at your best for eight to nine consecutive fixtures.
“In the case of championship sports, you only get one chance to perform.
“Sustained success in this competition requires a lot of preparation and hard work, and of course, a little bit of luck to get everything right.”
Mr Hawkins added that the school has focused its efforts on recruiting quality coaches including the likes of gold medal winning rower Duncan Free, international level coaches like Matt Taylor in rugby and Chris Nesbit in swimming, cricket director Steven Baker, and elite running coaches like Jackson Elliott.
“One major change TSS has made since 2000, has been the recruitment of outstanding coaches who are also educators of young men who keep sport in perspective at this level,” he said.
Regarded as the backbone of the GPS sporting competition, rugby is one of the premier sports of the competition.
In recent years, St. Joseph’s College, Nudgee has been the most successful school in GPS rugby based upon premierships with 10 titles since 2000.
Former Wallabies and Queensland Reds coach John Connolly said the GPS rugby competition has a strong record of producing talent for domestic and international rugby union.
“GPS Rugby is a very strong competition, I think it’s as strong as it ever was, the crowds are just as good as they’ve ever been,” Mr Connolly said.
“A lot of great players have come through the competition and gone straight to earn contracts in Super Rugby and then play for the Wallabies, Elton Flatley and James O’Connor to name a few.
“As Queensland coach, I used to watch as many games as possible, to have a great team, you need great players.
“GPS Rugby is the backbone of the GPS sporting year.”
O’Connor, who has made 64 Test match appearances for the Wallabies scoring 244 points, credited his time at Nudgee as crucial in his development as a playmaker in rugby union.
“I can’t talk any more highly about the program at Nudgee, I came there from the Gold Coast in grade 11 and literally was taught the game inside and out,” O’Connor said.
“We had some of the best coaches, the best specialist coaches, the best coaching I’ve ever had, it was very specific, very detail oriented, we learned the mechanics of the game.
“I look back on my high school rugby as the high of my rugby career, some of the finest rugby that I’d played.
“Preparing for these long seasons, every game in GPS is a must-win game, it’s like tournament rugby and it prepared me quite well for professional rugby.”
O’Connor inked his contract with the Western Force while he was still at Nudgee College, going onto become the youngest ever Super Rugby player at 17.
“It just happened so fast, when you’re that age, you don’t really have time to sit back and reflect it was all just happening in front of me,” he said.
“I was at school learning my craft and then the next year I was playing with guys who I looked up to for five, 10 years.
“There were some big names in that first Wallabies squad I was selected in, guys who I had almost emulated my game off, it was pretty incredible.”
Cricket is also a blue-ribbon sport in the GPS competition, with TSS the most successful school based upon premierships with 10 titles since 2000, including the 2024 season.
The Queensland-based championship is considered one of Australia’s best nurseries for producing talent, with notable cricketers coming through the competition including Queensland Bulls and Brisbane Heat players such as Michael Neser, Matt Kuhnemann, and Xavier Bartlett of TSS, Mitch Swepson and Nathan McSweeney of Nudgee, and Matt Renshaw of BGS.
Kuhnemann, who has played three Test matches for the Australian men’s cricket team against India, claiming batting maestro Virat Kohli as his maiden scalp before recording best figures of 5 for 16 in the third match of the tour, credited the GPS competition for his development as a player.
“I’ve had to give TSS a lot of credit for my upbringing in cricket and how I managed to play for high honours because of that school,” he said.
“Pretty much every morning and after school we would be down there training and I remember the net sessions being really competitive as well.”
In 2014, Kuhnemann played a key role in securing the First XI GPS Premiership for TSS, a triumph he looks back on fondly and rates as the highlight of his junior career.
“It was amazing, I remember those memories very fondly,” he said.
“We gelled as a pack, the coaches were excellent, we pretty much were undefeated for that whole year.
“I think there was a game against Churchie where I took a few wickets and made some runs, but it was very much a team effort that whole year round.”
Kuhnemann said the GPS competition is fiercely contested, with himself and Brisbane Heat team-mate Renshaw, who played for Brisbane Grammar School, regularly bringing up their encounters from the competition.
“I remember coming up against Renners (Renshaw) a lot of times, he probably still brings it up once a week that he got me out in Year 12,” he said.
“I remember getting him out once and he chucked a bit of a dummy spit, he reckons he wasn’t out, that also gets brought up weekly.
“They’re the memories that probably will stick with us forever.”
While third in the overall premiership race since 2000 with 24 titles, Ipswich Grammar School (IGS) was a run-away winner in the GPS Athletics (track and field) competition with 14 premierships.
Ipswich Grammar School has won 23 of the last 40 GPS Track and Field premierships, a record that earned the school ‘The Invincibles’ tag.
Acting Headmaster Tony Dosen said the school is able to unlock opportunities for students due to the long-term stability of key leaders and coaching staff.
“We believe that our school unlocks the opportunities in our boys,” he said.
“We provide a well-rounded and balanced boys education that allows each boy the opportunity to excel in their area of passion or skill.
“Our success in the sporting arena is due to the commitment and dedication of our boys both on and off the field.”
Over the years, the school has produced track athletes including 1988 Commonwealth Games hurdler Rodney Zuyderwyk, 2018 Commonwealth Games and 2024 Olympic Games 800m runner Joseph Deng, and Lynton Johnson who held 20 GPS records at one stage.
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