LBA, Launceston Tornadoes bringing back women's div one comp

A 12-week Super League featuring three teams will start on April 27 with games each Thursday at 7.15pm.

The Tornadoes' NBL1 squad will participate with most playing and some coaching.

LBA president Craig Gibson said there would be three or four Torns players in each team along with the best local junior and senior players.

"It's to provide a higher level of competition for the girls so they can play against the likes of Tornadoes' Riley (Lupfer) and Keely (Froling) and see where the level is at and give them a clear picture of the pathway from domestic juniors through to semi-professional and professional basketball," he said.

Gibson said the Torns were also helping out with the junior Aussie Hoops program while the LBA were assisting the Tornadoes with administration.

He added LBA clubs would also be more involved in the Torns' home games.

Gibson said it was an exciting partnership.

"It's been a bit of struggle along the way with both organisations being separate and we've slowly been trying to bring them both in together and work towards making basketball, particularly for the women's side of our competition, a stronger and more visible option," he said.

Gibson explained the recent history of the women's domestic competition.

"We've tried different options to get div one women's running again and quite often we'd have 3-4 teams to put on the floor," he said.

"The last few years there's only been two or three which is not a viable competition.

"We've been trying different options, most of which haven't been ideal."

He said the hope was to grow the competition to 5-6 teams.

The president elaborated on why it had been difficult to draw numbers.

"I don't think it's exclusive to basketball, female participation in sport is a tricky one for all sports with trying to keep players engaged and playing," he said.

READ MORE: The Interchange: Top bowling performances from Cricket North two-dayers

He provided insight into why that may be the case in basketball.

"You find a lot of the higher-end talent in women's basketball get the opportunity to travel and they potentially leave the state and pursue basketball elsewhere," he said.

"Which then reduces the number of players locally. Ten years ago that probably wasn't as big an option whereas it is now."

He provided further insight into how the LBA had responded to the numbers issue.

"We used to run a division one on top of (division two) and it got to a point where there weren't enough teams to sustain that," he said.

"It rolled back to div two level and we've had (division one) exhibition games basically the last couple of years where we had two teams playing each other once every three or four weeks just to keep an option for players at that higher-end of ability. Otherwise they had to play div two or on the North-West Coast in the inter-town competition.

"It's made it really difficult and we've probably lost some of those better players from Launceston basketball because div two is not necessarily the level they want to play at.

"Whereas now at least they can keep playing here locally and choose if they want to go further out and play in different leagues as well."

Gibson explained numerous Tornadoes had been playing domestic basketball on the Coast in previous years.

Torns president Corey McGrath said the partnership would ensure the players were accessible to the basketball community.

"Boys and girls throughout Launceston will have the opportunity to be coached by and interact with someone like Opals squad member and Tornadoes captain Keely Froling," he said.

"We are confident this will inspire the next generation of Tornadoes."

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: