Kapiti Basketballers Keen to Get to Vegas – Kāpiti and Coast Independent

Highly sought after selection!

By Angelo Robinson

Left to right – Coach Angelo Robinson, Players – Moss Whitham, Victor Allen, Luke Dowdall, Samuel Maxwell, Leith Maxwell, Sereana Rokotakala, Rachael Pike. In front Coach Ben Maligieri.

Seven players from Kapiti attended the New Zealand Basketball Academy Camp held on Saturday 7 and Sunday 8 October at the ASB Arena in Wellington.

This was the first camp and first trial for the New Zealand Basketball Academy Age Group Teams Tour to Las Vegas in July 2018.

Two Kapiti Basketball Players, Victor Allen from Kapiti College, and Fraser Beggs from Paraparaumu College, were selected last year.

There were good numbers at the Camp with players attending from all over New Zealand.

The sessions were held from 9.30am to 3.00pm both days with players learning what they need to know to make the 2018 Tour Team to Las Vegas USA. Intense skills and drills were covered as well as actual game situations

There will be more Camps held in November, December and a four day camp in January 2018 after which the Teams for the Las Vegas 2018 Tour will be announced.

Playing against tough American teams

The purpose of the NZBA tour to Las Vegas is to expose New Zealand players to the intensity of the American style of play by competing against some of the best AAU Club Teams in the USA.

Playing at this level is excellent preparation for anyone with aspirations of gaining a USA College Scholarship.

With two tournaments (possibly three) being played the tour is intense, both for play, training, and compulsory study as students will be away from school at the start of Term 3.

This is an amazing opportunity for the players. The competition at these USA tournaments is fierce, with all the top age group teams from around the USA.

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STORY OF THE WEEK

Kāpiti Coast councillors have toured of one of Aotearoa's unique buildings, the heritage - listed Rotunda at the former Otaki Health Camp, the country’s first.

Jeremy Smith reports that the 105-year-old, eight-sided rotunda predates the Health Camp.

It wasn't actually built in Otaki, but was one of two built in Rotorua in 1915 as part of a military hospital, on the site of Rotorua’s present public hospital.

Later they were taken to Otaki for the opening of the health camp in 1931.

Full story in the main column (December 19).

100 Years Ago — and the Maori Long March begins

Māori politics was dominated by the influential MPs (and sometime Cabinet ministers) Māui Pōmare ( Waitara statue photo above) and Apirana Ngata.

The 1920's also saw the rise of Tahupōtiki Wiremu Rātana’s religious movement, and the emergence of Te Puea Hērangi in Waikato.

Ngata worked hard to foster Māori scholarship and education and preserve traditional arts and culture.

He convinced the government to establish a Board of Maori Ethnological Research (1923), a Maori Purposes Fund Control Board (1924) and a School of Maori Arts and Crafts in Rotorua (1927).

The Reform government also took the first, tentative steps towards settling longstanding Māori grievances.

Agreements with Te Arawa in 1922 and Ngāti Tūwharetoa in 1926 recognised their respective rights over the Rotorua lakes and Lake Taupō, and led to the establishment of trust boards with some government funding.

Commissions of inquiry which examined Ngāi Tahu grievances (1920–21) and the Waikato and Taranaki confiscations (1926–27) recommended that modest compensation be paid.