'I don't know if we can return to the past glories of the opals overnight but it looks as if we are on the right track.’


What makes you think we are on the right track?

Losing to teams far younger than us seems to me like we are in decline.

U17/U19 wc performances have never been a good indication of senior team success.
More than Half those women never even made it to wnbl level, others have gone pro elsewhere or are working regular jobs and some don’t come out of the ncaa as anything more than nbl1 level talent.

Take the recent u19 gems silver medal team. Only 3/12 have been marked as potential opals. 1 being Melbourne. The WC winning u17s had only 1 opals constant opal, Ezi and one possible, shelley

I'll give you opals depth chart post sandy brondello and paris olympics


2024 onwards
HC ?
AC ?
AC ?

AUSTRALIAN STOCKS (1992> 32y.o and younger)

G
COLE 92
GARRICK 92
LAVEY 93
NICHOLSON 93
WILSON 94
MANGAKAHIA 95
WEHRUNG 95
REID 96
WALLACE 96
ROCCI 98
SHELLEY 00
HEAL 01
MELBOURNE 02
DEEBLE 03
SWAIN 03

F
ALLEN 92
BLICAVS 93
TALBOT 94
SHARP 97
MALEY 98
HORVAT 98
BIBBY 98
SIMONS 00
POTTER 02
PUOCH 04

P
BUNTON 93
GARBIN 94
MIJOVIC 94
SMITH 96
FROLING 96
SCHERF 96
MCKAY 97
AOKUSO 98
MAGBEGOR 99
ANSTEY 01


Add any others who are possibilities


Enough on this list to remain a top 5 nation?

China were the favourites, the only team with close to a full squad.
Japan had 5 from olympics
Aus had 0

G
COLE 92
GARRICK 92
LAVEY 93
NICHOLSON 93
WILSON 94
MANGAKAHIA 95
WEHRUNG 95
REID 96
WALLACE 96
ROCCI 98
SHELLEY 00
HEAL 01
MELBOURNE 02
DEEBLE 03
SWAIN 03

Be taking WILSON MANGAKAHIA and WEHRUNG ( both showed they are not up to it ) out of those guard and replacing them with CONTI 98 ANTONIADOU 96


F
ALLEN 92
BLICAVS 93
TALBOT 94
SHARP 97
MALEY 98
HORVAT 98
BIBBY 98
SIMONS 00
POTTER 02
PUOCH 04

Need to add PIZZY 98 to this list

P
BUNTON 93
GARBIN 94
MIJOVIC 94
SMITH 96
FROLING 96
SCHERF 96
MCKAY 97
AOKUSO 98
MAGBEGOR 99
ANSTEY 01

Take BUNTON and MIJOVIC ( now Ernst) out of this list

OUT of this list. No Chance

COLE 92 - Couldn't guard anyone in Asia or Europe. Shot broke.
GARRICK 92 - Couldn't guard anyone in Asia or Europe. Too busy on socials
WILSON 94 - Too injury prone - No longevity
MANGAKAHIA 95 - Nope Nope Nope
REID 96 - No chance
WALLACE 96 - Too loose and poor decision maker
SHELLEY 00 - Only thing she can do is shoot a corner 3

SHARP 97 - Poor decision maker. Your spin move broke.
HORVAT 98 - Wont keep playing Basketball post college

BUNTON 93 - Give the girl a chance to get back into hoops. body broke
MIJOVIC 94 - Can't defend a lamp post
SCHERF 96 - Her agent will start asking for money to play
MCKAY 97 - Too small for international basketball
AOKUSO 98 - Lazy Lazy Lazy

^^ I really hope with your extreme level of negativity that you are not in any decision making roles, and that you are not involved in girls/women's basketball

Conti is aflw first
Antoniadou does not play enough wnbl

What is Horvat doing post ncaa?

Both Wallace and Mangakahia I don't count out because they were not meant to play more than 10 mins. Well known they are not in peak condition. Whitcomb n Rocci were to play bulk minutes I’m assuming.

I’m not sure Pizzey is even wnbl level long term. Has done much yet.

That's what I’m saying, why so much praise for a team that is track to drop several places in rankings.

Every team bar China had only a few practises.

The fact that the other teams were 2-4 years younger than us shows we are on a slide.

Why would you mention Erin Phillips in the same regards as Lauren Jackson and Penny Taylor lol.

Ikr lol

She was an ok pg or sg in the wnba and for Aus.

future team I see around 2026-2028
(2022 and 2024 won't change much from the current Tokyo/jordan team)

Future imo - no particular lineup starting, but names would be

PG HEAL-ROCCI-DEEBLE (r-Amoore?)
SG MELBOURNE-WALLACE-SWAIN (r-shelley?)
SF PUOCH-POTTER (r-Sharp?)
PF MAGBEGOR-SMITH (r-Froling?)
C AOKUSO-SCHERF (r-Mckay?)


Really only those that are in college now could change the above.

Bibby plays pf really and won't have the lateral quickness to defend international 3s
Horvat can defend the 3 but has no offensive game.

Molloy sucks, and he aint doing a great job at all.
Replace him before olympic qualification ASAP.

Bring beck back in.
They need to bring a couple of more young players to develop sooner rather than later or they'll,continue placing 5th well into the future and will never qualify for majors.
Develop ASAP Whittaker a c from ncaa, shearer a sf from ncaa.
Maybe convince a nation switch for king-hawea from texas
Bring into camp Others like Fourie, Reed, Mackey Williams, west, Williams, Tahata

Our pace is not as good as japan, our shooting or dribbling or passing, our defense or our desire.
We have height and that's it. We don’t do anything else well as a nation on the women’s side apart from being more physical in asia.

Nz need to start beating Korea to qualify for stuff at both seniors n juniors.

Only good thing is age of current crop.


Walker 20
Hippolite 21*
Walker 24
Richards 24*
Goulding 25
Boagni 25
Blair 26
Taia 26
Purcell 26
Davidson 26
Karatiana 29*
Paalvast 30*


* Likely these players will be replaced in the next few years

All ncaa girls are 18-22y.o.

I think they will have a very good squad maybe in 4-6 years time.

4-6 years

Nz ain't making
21 Jordan asia cup top 4
22 sydney wc
23 asia cup top 4
24 paris olympics

Aim should be
25 asia cup top 4
26 wc
27 asia cup top 4
28 Los Angeles olympics

It was whitcomb and size in the paint vs Japan, it would have been a blow out if it wasn't for whitcomb n Scherf.

16-7-8-3 for Sami
12-15 for scherf

Our guards were outdone,
Japan hit 4 3s, our defense stepped up to face guard, but then...
Beaten off the dribble so they dropped back on d to try contain penetration
Then they shot more from outside once again and passed through the open space on several Japanese back cuts
Rinse n repeat.


Face guarding them and keeping them in front and from shooting should be all in one. You never saw them wave a hand from 4ft away. Pressure d the whole game, something we suck at.

2004 born group very stacked, wouldnt suprise me if they win silver again at the 2023 u19 WC.
4-5 opals out of that group Imo.

U19 Players known like Puoch, loughridge, Borlase but players like brazel, heal, Ananiev, Crawshaw, burrows, pitman, nelson, dart etc have shown some potential.

Well with sandy it can't be familiarity, she’s used only 15 players over 4 years, only changes have been because of injury or 'mental break’

Sure the asia cup team haven’t been together and haven’t played with each other but neither have japan, 2/3 of that squad was new also,

Surely Kunek deserves her shot in qualifiers, has been killin it in euroleague for 2 seasons.

20-7-7 the other day.

Kunek averaging in euroleague

21.5 points
5.5 rebounds
9 assists

60% from 2
50% from 3
94% from ft


She should be the opals sf backup.

Kunek should definitely have been on the Opals team for the Olympics