DR JOHN RASCHKE AWARD | DANIELLE D'MORIAS

Danielle D’Morias is a well-known member of our community, particularly as our current Development Manager. However, Dani has been acknowledged with the Dr John Raschke award for her outstanding contribution to developing basketball. Danielle is incredible in her role with Hills Basketball, managing the sold out Hornets Academy program and developing a coaching pathway for young people in our community. Danielle also spearheaded the development of the Wheelchair program at Hills Basketball, from Skills Sessions to Waratah League. She was also a main contributor in our Waratah Wheelchair program evolving from a player allocation system to being integrated into our own representative program. Danielle’s passion and drive to make the game and community better is unmatched. 

ON-COURT PERFORMANCE

Within the Representative Junior Program, Hills Basketball achieved the most on-court success compared to all other associations in NSW. This is calculated over the season and contributes to the Associations overall success score. 

ON-COURT PERFORMANCE

Within the Representative Program, Hills Basketball achieved the most on-court success compared to all other associations in NSW. This is calculated using a particular formula that includes both Senior and Junior results. 

Coaching Program of the Year

HBA had 68 Representative coaches, 1 was a high performance coach and 14 are association coaches. We have over 60 coaches who run our Academy Sessions and of our representative coaches 27 have been involved in our Academy. HBA continue to run courses including one that had 55 participants and included a Wheelchair module.

Once again we were well represented in the State Program with David Hayman (Head Coach) and Dani D’Morias (Assistant) being involved. We also had a number of coaches develop further by becoming involved in the BNSW development pathways. HBA continues to invest in the coaches development sending 10 coaches to Canberra for the annual conference. The largest contingent from any association.

REFEREE PROGRAM OF THE YEAR | OVER 3,000 MEMBERS

The HBA referee program continues to grow. HBA’s regular Community Coaching Courses continue to over subscribe to the point where rostering referees to enough games to help them progress is starting to become a challenge. Highlights included having 10 referees selected for Senior Finals Weekend of which 3 refereed finals. 9 of our referees were selected for NBL1 East Finals of which 3 officiated in the grand finals. 2 were then asked to represent BNSW at the NBL1 national championships.

Three HBA referees have been selected for the WNBL panel, Michael Beevers, Haylee Cole and Nathan Paff. While Michael and Nathan were selected as NBL development referees. The icing on the cake for this year was the induction of Matt Townsend into the BNSW Hall of Fame for his contribution to Officiating over many years.

WHEELCHAIR PROGRAM OF THE YEAR

HBA continued its support of the Wheelchair Program by taking ownership of the Waratah team and integrating it to our overall Representative Program.

While in 2022 teams were allocated to associations in 2023 HBA took accountability and ran trials, appointed coaches and provided gear and support. Our Academy program is growing year on year. Hills Hornet Breanna Fisk has been selected to represent Australia in the Olympic Games qualifiers.