Basketball history for Southland Storm team

Morgan Hunter is excited about being part of Southland basketball history this week.

Hunter is part of the Southland Storm women’s team, a new brand created to take part in Basketball New Zealand’s D League running on Auckland’s North Shore from Wednesday to Saturday.

The former Minot University (North Dakota) graduate spent eight years in the United States playing basketball, studying and working before returning home to Invercargill. After a torn Achilles ruined her senior year playing college ball in the States, she hadn’t really dreamed of being part of the re-emergence of the women’s game back in Invercargill.

“It’s funny how everything plays out, but we haven’t had a Southland women’s team in three years because of Covid, so I’m just happy to be able to represent Southland again, connect with Bert and the other coaches,” she said.

Caption: Morgan Hunter playing for Minot University in the United States. She will be part of the inaugural Southland Storm team playing in the BBNZ D League this week. Pihoto: Supplied.

“I’m excited to pull the jersey on again, it’s an opportunity to show young Southlanders that there’s a pathway now. We’ve got D League and there’s a professional competition above that; there’s a very clear pathway for them to envision and it allows them to stay in New Zealand, so that’s really exciting.”

Hunter who graduated from Academy Southland, the two year programme designed to prepare the province’s best sporting talent for life on and off the court, in 2010 is joined in the Storm squad by current SBS Bank Academy Southland athlete Maddie Tinnock.

She hopes competitions like the D League and the new women’s professional competition, Tauihi Basketball Aotearoa, will create opportunities for players both locally and overseas.

“In the past we haven’t had that. For young girls to see that starting off for Southland in the age groups can lead to a Southland women’s team, which can lead to you getting noticed by coaches for the professional league, it just shows that pathway and allows home grown talent to stay in New Zealand and study and make money while playing basketball,” she said.

“It’s been a long time coming, but it is exciting. It also opens up the opportunity for (overseas) scouts to come over and look at our league and see what we are producing.”

The Storm, who will be coached by Bert Tobia and Richard Hamilton, with Moira Tinnock as manager, will rely heavily on the tight-knit nature of the squad and a fast paced attacking style.

“A lot of us play together already for Tuesday night league and Apples tournaments and the Gore Invitational. We have good connections and a lot of us know each others’ styles already so we are in a really fortunate position where practise is really natural for us and we are able to scrimmage and pick up on the plays pretty quickly,” Hunter said.

“We’ve got a really good style of play and we all just want to play off each other. We are looking for pace, we are looking to push the ball, fast breaks and quick transitions. We are very guard-heavy, we don’t have a lot of size, so we have to use our speed to our advantage.”

Southland Storm: Georgia Bedwell, Lucy Brown, Kiana Collett, Tyra Dunn, Sarah Hamilton, Grace Holland, Morgan Hunter, Lucy Kean, Jenn O'Connell, Maddie Tinnock.

Draw as follows:

Wednesday 9:45am v Northland Phoenix

Wednesday 8:15pm v TCBA Coasters (Tauranga City)

Thursday – Preliminary QFs and Quarter Finals