Australia

Basketball hype high in Tassie, but JackJumpers success is causing grassroots pain

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It is no secret that Tasmanians have a new-found love affair with basketball.

Since the Tasmanian JackJumpers entered the National Basketball League in 2021, interest in the sport has skyrocketed.

Each home game, thousands of Tasmanians don their green and yellow to cheer on the team — but the growing fanfare is creating headaches for grassroots basketball clubs.

In the state’s north, the Launceston Basketball Association has seen a 46 per cent increase in the number of players wanting to hit the court since the JackJumpers played their first season.

Association president Craig Gibson said while it was great so many people wanted to play the game, it now had 500 teams — 300 junior and 200 senior — and was struggling to give them all court time.

“We’re very much expecting to not fit everyone in this year,” he said.

“We’ll have to go back to the clubs and tell them, ‘We don’t have the space, you can only have this many teams’, which will mean there’ll be kids that don’t get to play.”

A man with a hat and black top looking at the camera while standing on a basketball court.
Mr Gibson fears kids may soon be turned away from playing basketball.(ABC News: Manika Champ)

The reason the association is struggling to accommodate the influx of players is court space.

It is a similar situation across the state, with Basketball Tasmania saying the state needs at least 26 new indoor courts to keep up with demand.

Junior basketballer in a red top with a ball running down a basketball court
The number of basketballers wanting to play in Launceston has increased by 46 per cent in the past 18 months.(Supplied: Launceston Basketball Association Facebook)

The Tasmanian government has plans to develop new facilities, but basketball organisations say they are still years away.

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