Gold Coast basketball’s talent explosion

Gold Coast Basketball kicked off their 60th year with a bang after it was revealed they are now Queensland’s biggest basketball association.

GOLD Coast Basketball have kicked off their 60th year with a bang after it was revealed they are now Queensland’s biggest basketball association.

After being the biggest junior association last season, the local league has deservedly snatched the overall title from Brisbane after years of success.

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“It tells us that we’re doing a great job,” said general manager Joel McInnes.

“The reality is that we now have an amazing access to facilities as a result of the Commonwealth Games legacy.”

Gold Coast Basketball is celebrating record junior numbers in 2019. Picture supplied.

The continued growth of the junior competition has forced the association to add an extra night of competition to cope with the number of teams.

Last year the winter competition was played over Friday and Saturday but in 2019, Wednesday night fixtures have been introduced after a spike in registration numbers.

“We’ve had significant growth over the past three years which has been helped by the brand new facilities at Carrara,” McInnes said.

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McInnes believes the rapid growth is due to some home grown heroics overseas.

“Basketball is burning again,” he said.

“We’ve had a number of Australians doing really well in the NBA and WNBA so that Australian success at a high level is inspiring the next generation.”

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However the American league’s current Aussie contingent may be surpassed by the next generation of talent if recent results are anything to go by.

“The next generation of talent is fantastic,” McInnes said.

“We have plenty of state players coming through and our girls program is excelling.

“We won the club nationals last year and were the first Gold Coast team to do so and only the second from Queensland so there’s a golden generation of female talent coming through.

“We’re knocking down the door for results and waiting for them to tally up junior performance but we might be the best performing junior basketball association in the country.”