Sport-by-sport - Basketball
Chairman | Roger Moreland | |
---|---|---|
Chief Executive | N/A | |
Performance Director | Chris Spice and Ron Wuotila |
Sport Profile
Funding Award (2009-2013) | £8,599,000 |
Best London 2012 Performance | Men 5th in group. Women 6th in group. |
Athletes on World Class Performance Programme | 39 |
Past Performances | |
Press Officer | Sarah Jenkins |
Press Officer tel | 020 7096 5846 |
Website | http://www.basketballgb.com |
National governing body | Brtiish Performance Basketball - On behalf of British Basketball Federation |
"I truly believe that I wouldn't be here today if it wasn't for Lottery funding. We put our bodies through a lot and without the financial support and everything that comes with being funded it has kept me here and healthy. It's given me such a great opportunity."
Jo Leedham
Basketball in the UK has received a massive boost due to London winning the right to host the London 2012 Olympic Games.
When UK Sport received the backing of Government in 2006 to fund every Olympic and Paralympic sport towards success in 2012, a new body, British Performance Basketball Ltd, was formed as a subsidiary of UK Sport to allow World Class investment into a GB performance programme for Basketball. Once the British Basketball Federation (BBF) was formally recognised by the sports councils in 2007, and BPB then became their subsidiary and continue to lead and manage the GB teams.
UK Sport invested £3.7 million into GB Basketball for the Beijing cycle, boosted to £8.6 million over the four years of the London cycle. This provides the players with an opportunity for high quality training and preparation camps with the support of their coaching and sport science and medical back-up team when they come together as GB, as well as a full international competition schedule.
The BPB has engaged in continuous assessment of its teams' performance and organisational progress through UK Sport's Mission 2012 performance management tool, to ensure they have every chance of achieving their goals for London 2012 and ensuring there is a high performance legacy for the sport by qualifying team by right for Rio 2016.
Did You Know?
Up and coming basketball player Zak Wells was identified by UK Sport's Talent 2016: Tall and Talented talent ID programme in 2010. Zak's grandfather (Billy Wells) competed at the 1968 Olympics in Boxing and was the Games' boxing captain and his uncle (Robert Wells) competed at the 1984 Olympics - winning a bronze medal in the superheavyweight class.
Selected athletes:
Men:
Kieron Achara
Robert Archibald
Eric Boateng
Dan Clark
Luol Deng
Joel Freeland
Kyle Johnson
Andrew Lawrence
Mike Lenzly
Pops Mensah-Bonsu
Nate Reinking
Andrew Sullivan
Women:
Dominique Allen
Rose Anderson
Kim Butler
Stef Collins
Temi Fagbenle
Chantelle Handy
Jo Leedham
Julie Page
Natalie Stafford
Azania Stewart
Rachael Vanderwal
Jenaya Wade-Fray