It is vital to acknowledge the significant impact that this funding will have in supporting both the Under-17 women (Sapphires) and Under-17 men (Crocodiles) who this year will compete in the FIBA Asia Cup qualification system in order to achieve passage to compete at their respective FIBA World Cups in 2018.

The landscape for Australian basketball has changed with inclusion to a qualification system making us a part of Asia and this extends to all national teams and captures our identified emerging Opals and Boomers talent.

Our Sapphires and Crocodiles will compete in the FIBA Under-16 Asia Cup for the first time and selection camps were held concurrently in early September 2017.

“Both of these junior national teams have a load of talent and are evidence of the great work that is done in our state high performance network in coaching, developing, and preparing these athletes to represent Australia on the global stage,” said Basketball Australia CEO Anthony Moore.

“It was an unexpected challenge to be informed by FIBA that the Asia Cup qualification system would be applied across the youth age groups starting in 2017 but it is a fantastic opportunity for the Opals and Boomers that can now extend to our emerging athletes,” said General Manager of High Performance, Jan Stirling.

Basketball Australia is pleased to once again acknowledge the tremendous support from Commonwealth Games Australian (CGA) through the “NextGEN” funding which has been timed perfectly to help fast track the developing youth of the Under-17 national teams.

The FIBA Under-16 Asia Cup for women will be held October 22-28 in Bengaluru, India whilst the FIBA Under-16 Asia Cup for men is to be confirmed in the coming weeks.