WY Basketball launched to maximise sport's potential through education and unification

More youngsters play basketball than they do rugby or cricket, two of the quintessentially English sports.

And yet basketball lags behind in terms of funding for grassroots, local infrastructure and national exposure. There are plenty of pockets of noble work and success stories, but sometimes a lack of cohesion.

That has been identified to be the case in West Yorkshire, where two men have launched WY Basketball, a community interest company that is not-for-profit and aimed at using basketball as a vehicle to improve lives, health and communities in the region.

Mark Mills, who got Leeds Force into the BBL a decade ago, and Greg Dolan who launched Spen Valley Vipers from five friends into six senior and junior teams, have teamed up to try and create an umbrella organisation that operates for the benefit of the sport.

“What we’re trying to do from a basketball perspective is fill the gaps,” begins Mills. “We’ve a lovely big county but it doesn’t have a big basketball provision.

“There are some good examples; you’ve got Matt Newby at the north side of Leeds doing City of Leeds, you’ve got the guys at LDM in the city centre and the south, you’ve got Bradford Dragons doing a good job, and then there’s several other small pockets of good practice.

“But there’s loads of gaps of where there’s holes in provision. Some of the things we’re looking at is 18-year-olds; they play national league and then that’s it, as soon as they finish education their only real option is to go and play local league against someone in their mid-40s whose just out for a bit of fun.

“There’s no national league women’s team in the whole of West Yorkshire, and that’s criminal. I’ve got two daughters, what can they go into? The highest you can play is local league.

“And then the other thing is the community engagement. There are some clubs doing good things but there are huge swathes where there’s no basketball going into schools, there’s no inspiration for kids to take up the sport.”

Taking the example of a rise in knife crime as a social problem that basketball can help solve through education, Mills continues: “Basketball can take kids that aren’t engaged with other sports and bring them into a really healthy, positive environment that can be life changing.

“Up in the north east Teesside Lions have just launched an initiative where they go into schools, they do an assembly with the players, talking about positive choices in life. But what they also did which is a bit shocking but I think gets the point home, is they teamed up with a medical provision partner who came in with dummies and showed the students, obviously of a certain age, what a knife wound does to a human body. And they showed them first aid.

“It’s not preventative, but it’s a step forward.”

Combining basketball with education is at the forefront of their ambition.

“We’d like to develop education programmes,” he continues. “Hoops for Health has been very good in the UK; going into schools with a menu of topics; healthy eating, hydration, fitness etc, and you deliver a classroom session by one of the players.

“They also get basketball coaching as part of this session, that school is entered into a tournament. Linking the inspiration and aspiration of basketball to targeted health messages - these are the things we want to do.”

To give them credibility when they go to Sport England for grants or closer to home seek commercial support, they have set up Friends of WY Basketball - an advisory board of sorts - that includes sports administrators like former Huddersfield Town director and now Leicestershire CEO Sean Jarvis, and ex Bradford Bulls Foundation chief Paul Mitchell.

“They’re trying to connect us with different people around the area,” says Mills.

“That’s the big challenge with getting these projects off the ground, gaining momentum, and we are slowly but surely gaining momentum.”

Mills is determined to stress that this new entity is not a rival to existing organisations, but one that will work together with those providers to increase the profile of the sport and use it as a vehicle for good.

“We don’t want to tread on any toes, this is not about ego wars, this is about us finding the gaps and trying to be a unifying force,” explains Mills.

“Let’s go to Sport England and bid for some big pots of money for us to deliver county-wide initiatives that are delivered by Bradford Dragons, by City of Leeds, by LDM. If they go individually they don’t have that same voice, we can get people to listen to what we’re trying to do.

“For example there’s someone trying to deliver a basketball-specific facility in Huddersfield and we’re seeing how we can help them. Are there other things we can do; can we host our central venue league finals at his facility when he gets it open?”

For both men, it is a project of passion.

“Greg was the one who came to me saying he wanted to push things forward,” says Mills. “The timing was perfect for me, always something I’ve wanted to do, so the two of us are the driving force.

“We’re not here to be a rival of clubs, or be a threat, we’re here to help them grow.

“We’re not trying to be a governing body or a federation, we’re trying to be a facilitator.

“All basketball institutions have exactly the same issues and they’re all trying to achieve the same things.

“The biggest issue is funding. It’s the second highest participation sport among Under 16s, more people play it than rugby and cricket combined but gets nowhere near that funding.

“Is it unconscious bias leading to this? People in power are probably going to fund the sports they played when they were young. Basketball is out in the cold.

“Facilities is another issue. Coaching infrastructure is another, there aren’t enough coaches to deliver good quality basketball sessions. These are all things a unifying force can bring together.

“If you’re a small basketball club, how are you supposed to run a coaches workshop to get your coaches qualified? If we bring 10 of those clubs together then yes we can run a coaching course to develop their skills and get them their qualifications.”

Mills concludes: “There’s no way you’re going to maximise basketball in this region without people working together.

“For me personally, I’m not trying to build a business and make money, I’m trying to use my experience and skillset to make basketball better in this region.”