Some of Tamworth Basketball's 30-odd junior referees. Back (L-R) Jordan Hansen, Serena Waters, Bronte Chillingworth, Trevor Wilcox (referees director); Middle (L-R) Sienna Kennedy, Claire Salter, Ben Foster, Max Chillingworth; Front - Jason Chick. Photo: Geoff O'Neill 130313GOC01
IT’S a common theme among sporting organisations – a shortage of officials, particularly referees.
The Tamworth Basketball Association is looking to address this by investing in its juniors.
The TBA is two years into a five-year development program for officials.
Being driven by referees director Trevor Wilcox, the program covers referees, bench officials and referee coaches, and has seen some good results.
“At this stage we have 36 junior referees in training within our Tamworth Basketball Association,” he said.
“This is better than most associations in Country NSW.”
From what he’s seen too they’d stack up against “a lot of” the refs operating in Country NSW.
The program came about through the need for more referees.
“We’ve got a lot of commitments for officials,” Wilcox said.
For each rep team competing in the Northern Junior League they have to supply two refs. Presently they’ve got 11 teams.
Then there’s local commitments. Just on a Wednesday night alone they need 10 refs for each of the five time slots.
“If it wasn’t for these juniors we’ve got in the program basketball would be sorry for it,” Wilcox said.
They probably have about 15 active senior refs at the moment. Hopefully in a few years time they’ll have a lot more.
“My goal is that they (juniors) come through to referee seniors,” Wilcox said.
He advised that later this month the TBA will be running Level 0 and Level 1 referees courses.
Meanwhile Rex Nottage is back in Tamworth this weekend for a coaches clinic. The Director of Basketball at Newington College, Nottage will cover a range of topics including developing offensive skill sets to enhance your team offence, developing basic defensive skill sets to enhance your team defence.
The clinic will run from 6.30pm to 8.30pm on Saturday and is free.