Basketball New Zealand High Performance Update

BBNZ High Performance Team

As I reach the two-month milestone of being in the role of High Performance General Manager for Basketball New Zealand, I thought it was an opportune time to provide everyone with an update on some of the new and exciting initiatives we have established as part of BBNZ High-Performance program moving forward.

The landscape for our high-performance programs has changed significantly with FIBA’s Oceania pivot to Qualifying through Asia. This has transformed the way in which we will provide access to development opportunities for our teams, athletes and coaches. We have established a set of key initiatives that will drive our development programs and ensure they are world’s best practice and that they meet the needs of the agreed outcomes of the High-Performance Program.

What is High Performance?

In January 2018 Basketball New Zealand held a National Coaches Conference, this conference was the first opportunity to discuss and explore what High Performance is in New Zealand and what role it will play for our athletes and coaches. It was decided that the entry level into Basketball New Zealand’s High-Performance program would be those athletes that are turning 14 years old, upwards to the athletes participating in our 19&U national program. The agreed definition of High Performance:

Is a program that will identify potential High-Performance athletes, provide the right environment and experiences to allow them to develop into High Performing athletes so they can achieve success in representing New Zealand in key bench mark events.

BBNZ will identify potential High Performing coaches, invest in their development so they can provide the athletes with a consistent elite level training environment and develop High Performing Teams while evolving into change resilient coaches.

National Teams

We recently announced all of the National coaches for our age group teams, we are extremely fortunate to have secured an experienced and committed group of coaches who will, no doubt, represent New Zealand in a professional capacity. There have been a number of changes within the National team program, please find a few of them below;

National Team Camps

New Zealand National teams will now be allowed 3 camps in preparation for their bench mark event for the year. Our first camp of the year will be near the Waitangi Day weekend, the second National camp will be held over the April school holidays and the final national team camp will be held over the October Labour Day weekend. Each team will also have a pre-departure camp prior to leaving for their nominated competition.

National Talent Program

Basketball New Zealand’s National Talent Program has been re-engineered to make the process of identification of athletes less onerous, broadly more consistent and more cost effective. The Associations will still be asked to nominate those athletes they feel Basketball New Zealand should track and monitor at key competition events and BBNZ will have talent spotters at those key completion events assessing the athlete’s talent levels. However, once the National Championships have been completed, BBNZ will offer those athletes we feel have the greatest chance of playing for our National teams within a 5 – 10 year window an opportunity to attend a position specific camp. At that camp, the athletes will be further exposed to our National Style of Play and they will be evaluated on their skill competencies, athletic ability and basketball understanding (IQ). If an athlete performs well at the position specific camp, they may be invited to attend a National camp in their age group the following year. This is the new process for identification and development of athletes within the National Talent Program.

Those athletes that were part of the Basketball New Zealand National Talent Program in 2016 and haven’t received an invitation to a National camp this year will now be captured under the revised National Talent Program. We hope to see your name nominated from your home Association and we will monitor you at the National competitions later this year.

Depth Charts

Basketball New Zealand will now be using Regional and National depth charts to capture our most talented athlete’s physical and athletic details and they will be ranked in order of ability. Each region / Association should already have a copy of the new depth chart. They have been asked to manage the Depth charts and send updated information to BBNZ quarterly. Basketball New Zealand will manage its own National depth chart, any athlete appearing on the National depth chart will be considered a High-Performance athlete and will be part of Basketball New Zealand’s new National High-Performance training program. We are working hard to get this new National High-Performance program up and running and we will be in touch once we have more information on this program.

National Style of Play

And finally, Basketball New Zealand has a style of play, this style of play was introduced at the National Coaches Conference and is being rolled out at a series of coaching / player clinics. We would like as many Associations as possible to adopt our National Style of Play, however we ask for creativity from those early adopters of our National style of play. We don’t want a Nation of clones, we want a consistent approach to our teaching, we want a consistent terminology and we want our athletes to be exposed to a solid foundation of skills that underpin the National Style of Play.

Philosophically this new High-Performance program is about creating a culture of excellence and establishing a program that athletes and coaches aspire to be involved in. To achieve our goals the new High-Performance program can’t be run in isolation, we are totally dependent upon partnerships and collaboration within our national network to ensure we have the most effective and robust system. In my short time in the role I have witnessed a strong spirit of cooperation within the basketball community, it is great to see that renewed enthusiasm and willingness from people at every level of the game to work together.

Basketball New Zealand - High Performance 

You are recieveing this email as part of Basketball New Zealand's database of associations

Unsubscribe