Brian Ramsamy and Taneesa Hampton invited to National Indigenous Performance Camp

A duo of the Territory’s best young basketball talents will get their chance to learn what it takes to become an elite athlete at a national high performance camp. Check out their reactions.

Northern Territory basketballers Brian Ramsamy and Taneesa Hampton have been invited to the inaugural National Indigenous Performance Camp.

Two of the NT’s basketball rising stars have been invited to the inaugural National Indigenous Performance Camp to get insight into what it takes to become an elite athlete.

Brian Ramsamy and Taneesa Hampton, both 17, have proven themselves top talents in recent years and will take their games to a whole new level with this exposure.

The initiative aims to enhance the representation on Indigenous athletes in basketball, and provides them with the opportunity to learn from high performance coaches from across the country.

Throughout the camp they will be introduced to different playing styles, concepts, strategies and skills that are integral to Basketball Australia programs.

Ramsamy started playing basketball with his mates when he was 13 with Uni Rebels, and has since gone on to show off his talents not just in the Darwin comp, but with the NT rep sides as well.

Now, he’s excited to learn more and keep pushing to see how he can get with the game, with a particular want to play alongside his brother, Jason Ramsamy, at the Darwin Salties.

Northern Territory basketballer Brian Ramsamy have been invited to the inaugural National Indigenous Performance Camp.

The Salties are also home to Deba George and Nate Jawai, who are among the athletes who have been inspirations to him on his journey.

“This will be a great experience, I’m looking for to it a lot, it will be good to go down and represent the NT,” Ramsamy said.

“Basketball is a great sport, it’s great to play with your mates and though it gets competitive sometimes that’s always good at teaching us to be better.

“Getting to go to nationals was great, it shows you how small Darwin and the NT is compared to the other states and how good they are at basketball down south

“I’ll just see where it takes me, it would be great playing for the Salties and teaming up with my brother there.”

Meanwhile, Hampton has been playing basketball since she was six, when she joined Lightning as a junior player.

She had a stint with the Uni Rebels later on before returning to her first club to play Premier League alongside one of her own idols, Claire-Maree Hunt.

Hampton has also had the chance to play around the Salties women and is likely to get more chances with them into the future.

“It’s always good going interstate to learn from people of a higher level and training alongside stronger and faster players,” she said.

“I’m looking forward to the opportunity and seeing what I can learn from it.

Northern Territory basketballer Taneesa Hampton have been invited to the inaugural National Indigenous Performance Camp.

“Being a local from Darwin and only being young now playing for the Salties is definitely a goal of mine going forward.

“It’s great for all the little girls to see that level of basketball regularly and for kids my age it’s great to know we don’t need to move away from home to play at a top level.”

Basketball NT High Performance Manager Rod Tremlett said it was great for the sport in the Top End to have these athletes take their talents down south for the camp.

“We’re super excited for both these talented, young athletes, and that talents have been recognised to be selected for this inaugural camp,” Tremlett said.

“They’ll be exposed to everything from different playing styles and individual skill development to off court things like strength and conditioning and the stuff elite athletes are exposed to.

“The aim is to try and produce as many athletes as we can to make the Australian teams into the future.

“For us here we have the Salties, which while in its infancy has provided the aspirational piece for the younger kids to stay in Darwin and achieve playing at that next level.”