Eight teams get into their minivans this Thursday and head off for the trip of a lifetime. The Basketball Pacific Easter Tournament being held in Tauranga over the long weekend has attracted over 100 teams from around New Zealand and Australia across all age groups.

New Plymouth Basketball Association is sending eight teams including an U12 Boys, U13 Boys and Girls, two U15 Boys teams, an U15 Girls team along with an U17 Girls and Boys team. This is the culmination of months of effort by players, coaches, managers and administrators who have all been working hard to make this happen.

This would be the first time for many years (if ever) that the association has been able to pull together teams from nearly all age groups and send them off together to particpate in such a large basketball tournament. The development tournament has run been over many years but this is the first time that New Plymouth will participate as a fully fledged member of Basketball Pacific.

"We are extremely excited by the prospect of being part of the Basketball Pacific organisation and being involved in a tournament of this size and nature. These players are our future and this will go a long way towards creating a positive experience for our young players and hope it will encourage them to stay involved for years to come" says NPBA President Kevin Fenwick.

Six of our players have been invited to stay on after the tournament to particpate in an elite camp run by Hall of Fame coach Jim Foster who is the current Head Coach of division one university women’s team Tennessee and President of world association of basketball coaches, Patrick Hunt. The invited six are Brianna Latavao, Tayla Murray, Bayley Ransfield, Dane Brooks, Beauden Giddy and Baxter Fenwick.

NPBA wishes all teams the very best for the weekend and trusts they will have a fantastic time. Go hard and leave it all on the court.

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