whats to mention, if you can't mention u/18 players?

looking forward to it actually

Game fixtures BADLY scheduled there should be no home court advantage in any of the games leading up to finals.

State Champs.......Yey whoooooo! Cant wait.

Is that enough hype?

I notice a couple of Country Associations, but maybe they should have the winners of the Country Champs invoited to play?

or is it just the Adelaide "State" championships?

Bit boring - sturt keep winning - when are the other clubs gonna get better.

Come on south, southern, centrals, woodville get your acts together. North, forestville and west do challenge try to challenge the blues.
Mavs are good in 1 grade.

Says it all - boring

State Champs are as boring as English Premier League and AFL before the draft. Same old same old.

Boring!!!!! Just playing the same teams.

"Boring"

Woodville and Mavs are doing very well in the girls u16 div 1. Games are very close between the top 4.

It's a carnival! Come on!
Same old, same old, but if you're not in SASI or a state team you get to see how well you & your team can back up and back up and back up.
If you are lucky enough to be metro based, you get to sleep in your own bed and "chill" in your own zone, still play a carnival and your parents aren't paying out *more* money for travel & accomm.

Lack of hype...well, probably too busy working out the logistics of who's going where with whom! (Not only about Formals!)

State Champs are the gateway to National Club Championships, to the Melbourne Classics and other national competitions that you don't need to be in a state team to access.

Maybe some clubs don't sell this strongly enough...personally, that's why I think there should be no question for the kids who want to play footy too. The answer at state champs time is "no". It's not fair on the team mates who want to give going to nationals their best shot.

There. That's my hype :-)
wooo hooo!

Looks like it's pretty much Sturt across the board.

Forestville have to be favourite to take out the girls again. Didn't they clean sweep summer 12s-18s?

Sturt to win the boys in a canter.

hypo maniac

You obviously do not have a kid playing 2 sports at an elite level. We have a couple of Kids that play country sport and have footy representative and association participation and they quite often find that trainings are at the same times as bball both midweek and on sundays. I know a lad at our club that will have to choose very soon as he realizes that he can't train both and he will choose what he believes is his passion. He has been to numerous classics and interstate tournaments and loves that side of it. Unfortunately as he can't train, he quite rightly states that it is only fair to his team mates to give them opportunity. It is not that he is not committed, it is simply impossible to pursue both at the same level. Kids like him are competative like you do not believe so to suggest they are not committed is ludicrous. It is a pity as once again we lose kids to other sports.

Forestville in the Girls
Sturt in the Boys

OK. Everyone seems to agree Sturt are pretty good. Why is that? What does Sturt do differently than other clubs?
All clubs pull from a simialar size area. Is it just socio-economics or are the coaches and players that much better?

Stronger and stable committess is why they are so strong.

man i have already asked you once to pick another name coz this one is taken.

The REAL murray magpie

Sturt and Forestville are strong simply because they have good training programs and teach the kids correctly. Therefore kids and parents are attracted to these clubs cause they want the best training they can get.... No problems with that ...

# 184655

It is a yawn - guarantee you are at a bottom club.
Don't go into business you won't last long. People like you are why the game cannot and will not prosper.

The only way the comps will get better is to let the best 10-12 teams in each age group form the div 1 comp regardless of club. Then you get the best kids competing against each other. If clubs are hard working enough and smart enough to get off their arses and nuture and coach kids then they deserve the results they get. To say you can never catch up is so south australian its not funny. Stay in your own little fishbowl and protect the nothing that you have. Stop canning the clubs and the kids that want to get better and compete. People with your attitude piss me and many others off. Take your kid to ballet.
You are like the theory that if you did not have a summer comp you would lose kids - small minded but that is another topic. Anything that is outside of the square or looks to create competition obviously scares you. Waste of life .........

Agree with victorian and anon above. I will go a step further and say that unless change is made at the top the sport will keep going backwards. Everything is done for the wrong reason. Was it about 10 years ago Vic Bball was in the same state and they accepted change and look where they are now - do not use the population excuse either - thats a cop out !!! When you have a system iat SASI whereby a lot of the better players choose not to go, what does that say - nothing has changed in 30 years !!! Get the elite playing the elite and wow, you will notice the difference.

anon #184692,
why will clubs fold? In the victorian system it has not only seen a growth in numbers of players in the sport, but also in numbers of clubs, as well as a changing of the strong from the weak. 15 years ago, Dandenond and Knox were also-rans with Nunawading and Bulleen being the top dogs. look at it now, with Wayverly, Sandringham and country teams like ballarat and even bendigo playing.

clubs will only fold if they aren't willing to put in the extra work!

Parents need to grow a brain. It is better to play Div 1 at a "lower" club then play div 2 at a "stronger" club. Plus it is much better for comp. Half of the forestville girls and Sturt boys in Div 2 could play div 1 at any other club.

As for better coaching; I have never seen div 2's get the same amount of time and effort as the div 1's get. And that applies to every club. even Sturt and Forestville

Easy,

Why move clubs when you aren't going to get good coaching.

If club A, where you are playing div 2, have been able to make you better than opposing players from club B, where said players are playing div 1, then surely you are only going to improve at the same rate as those players who you are already better than.

But now the other kids who stay at Club A are continuing to improve at a greater rate than you, so in 2 years time, the kids who stays will be better than you and take your spot in div 1 at your new club putting you back in div 2.

anon #185231, maybe she made it despite receiving poor coaching. If she was at a better club she might have been better. and if a kid isn't in the top 8-10 at their current club, they aren't going to make it to that level no matter where they play.

If other clubs want all the "Div 2 gold" that abounds at the "big two", why cant they attract it?

You would think that with the general view on how these two clubs are choked with country kids that have no talent combined with coaching staff that must be pushing their own agendas, that the decision to move to a lower Div 1 club would be easy.

It just isnt so.

The fact is moving to a club that has shown no promise combined with a rudderless coaching style is not the ideal way to improve your game.

Dont mistake game time for actually improving your game.

If 10 players are in front of you, then maybe you are not going to become the next Michael Jordan. So what is the point of moving to a club when you may not make it anyway. If you do you aren't going to improve and make it to your potential level. If you stay and keep working, you might crack into the div 1 team and feel a reward for your hard work.

And therefore you are going to learn more life lessons and build more friendships from being loyal and playing at your local club. Which considering only 1 in every 1000 are going to make a career out of basketball is the more important thing

I am sure that most kids swap clubs because the parents ego has taken a blow, not because the kid wanted to move in the 1st place.

It has been happening for years and will continue to happen. Thankfully the rules have now been tightened to stop the mid season merry go round.

I must disagree. Training, practice, working out on your own is where the most improvement is done. That's what training/practice is designed for. Games are where you get to TEST how much you improve. There will be some benefit but not as much as well structured, sequenced practice. The latest research in the area of skill acquisition confirms this. Google it if you need more information.

When you were in class at school, you learnt more when you were doing practice questions in the book than in the actual test. I know I did. It's the same in good programs. It may not be the case in poorly strictured ones.

And the majority of the population do believe this, as they continue to stay at the clubs that provide great programs because they improve more even though they are playing at a lower level.

This point is debatable anyway. At a good club playing Div 2's mean competing at least twice weekly against the best kids in the State anyway. If they go to a lower club they will only see those same kids once every 10 weeks. Furthermore if you are a first year (which the majority of div 2's are) you play at the highest level at least every second year anyway.

This debate has been raging on this forum for years and like many, it goes around and around in circles. The fact is, most people do not "club hop" because it is not in their best interests. If it was, they would have been doing in en masse for years.

#185297, This happens in effective trainings run by experienced coaches. Go out and watch them. Legendary college coach Bob Knight says that he makes his trainings much more difficult than games so games become seamingly easier and players are able to execute at a high level under pressure. It can be and is done effectively at good programs even at club level.If it wasn't people would have voted with their feet ages ago.

#185320, we have viewpoints at opposite ends of the spectrum and will never agree. No problem it is a discussion board. The fact that most people do not do as you propose means that the majority do not agree with your position. Some do and they do as you say. You may be right, but if you are the majority are wrong.

I didn't decide just stating my position and that the majority of people do not go to a lesser program to play in a higher division, and therefore must hold the same general view. Some agree with 185320, as you do, and would move in this situation.

Picture (#185461)& (#185470) as two naughty school boys, pushing and shoving!

anon #185339,

2 people with the same view doesn't mean that it is a majority.

With the number of people staying put, I would suggest you are a minotiry. In fact more people would be moving to the better clubs than away from them. Which says that providing a better service to members is more important than being able to offer a div 1 posititon.

Over the last 20 years, this has always been the case, just with some clubs improving (Forestville) and some clubs getting worse. (North/West)

Ahhh, hadn't got your "zones good" quota out this week yet?

"Most would happily endorse pro/rel if zones were implemented to support it" ?? Two separate issues.

Pro/rel is about having fewer lopsided games now.

Zones are supposed to solve the long term problem, but don't make sense. You can't divide Adelaide into ten zones of equal socio economic areas with equal numbers of children, so every club starts the same.

Even if you could, is it likely that the competition is going to be any less lop sided than it is now? No. There will still be two or three strong clubs, several in the middle and a few struggling.

Why? Because not all of the clubs will have the same success in attracting the kids within their zone into district basketball. Some clubs will be better than others, it may not even be the same clubs that currently dominate the comp.

More kids will play basketball if they are encouraged to play for the club that is closest to where they live, because they usually train somewhere in that area and play half their games there. You can't draw zones in Adelaide so that everyone will be zoned to play for their nearest club, yet give all the clubs equal access to the same number of potential players.

As for the argument (#185486) about North girls going to Forestville, what's that got to do with zoning? If a zone was in place, players moving house would either be forced or have an option to change clubs, regardless of the relative strength of the clubs involved. If you force them to change clubs when they move house, some kids will drop out rather than change. If you give them an option, the decision would be made on the relative strengths of the clubs, not onteh basis of what is best for the competition.

All that zoning would achieve would be a large number of false addresses in the BSA player database, as every player would supply a valid mailing address within the correct zone. Suddenly a large number of players would be listed as living at a club stadium!

And North's girls programs would be some what weaker if zoning was brought in as a lot of girls have come from Centrals.

I had always been pretty much against Pro/Rel as I could only see my Club's point of view, which as one of those not going as well as it had in the past, I was convinced that the Club could not possibly benefit.

However, I am starting to be swayed, if partly out of morbid curiousity (especially as my children no longer play Junior District Ball), just to see if the Div 1 Competitions did become Sturt 1,2 & 3, Forestville 1,2 & 3, North 1 & 2 & Norwood 1 & 2, with the other 6 Clubs disappearing from Division 1, over the next 5 years, which the naysayers predict.

However, I think that the other 6 Clubs, may actually benefit from the threat of losing a Guaranteed Division 1 spot, and as pointed out in numerous other threads on the subject "get off their bums and find new players" especially at the younger age group.

Of course, the problem might be that it may be easier to then just change to one of the "Super" Clubs anyway, as a number of Coaches have done over recent years.

For instance there are at least 3 Sturt Coaches High Level (Division 1 or 2, depending on the year) who were former Tigers Coaches, so have they moved for their development or because the better players were there? I don't know because I haven't asked them (and quite frankly would expect not to be told anyway, if I did ask). Not trying to single out Sturt, but I just knew of three off the top of my head.

What I do know is that the current Junior system doesn't appear to be working, however I am not quite sure what Basketball should be aiming for. Is the best sign of Club success: -

- National U14's
- Classic Success (In a Victorian based tournament,
whom I would guess make a bucketload of cash of SA
every year!)
- ABL Success
- National Level Success (foprmer players to AIS,
WNBL or NBL)

We (Clubs generally) seem to do a reasonable (average to very good, but reasonable city wide) job of looking after our Juniors, up until they turn 17, but very few Clubs (apart from State Champs) seem to pay very little attention to U20's, or Players that aren't going to be part of ABL Teams. The Club I am involved with was an offender (and still is in some repsects) with that. I don't know what it is, but there must be a better way to instill a club atmosphere, to have more people stay involved. For all the success that clubs like Sturt & Forestville have had in Junior ranks over the past 10 years, they should be absolutely dominating ABL (without the need for outside recruits), but this just isn't the case, so even those two (currently very succesful) clubs could still do it better.

I now think that maybe we do need to look at something different and if that is Pro/Rel (without zoning) then give it a try , to try and shake up the whole Sport in this State. Maybe it is time to kiss the U20/U21 Comps good bye and replace them with an U23 Comp to be played either as Curtain raiser to ABL or on one of the other weeknights, maybe replacing Division 5, to keep our Juniors (and potential Coaches) involved in the Club that may have played for (some for up to 10 years)

Just some thoughts after watching a bit of the State Champs last weekend.

Flame away!!!