The Cannons revival dream is on the backburner for as long as Canberra's indoor facilities crisis remains unresolved, warns incoming Basketball ACT boss Nicole Bowles.
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Bowles shattered the glass ceiling with the announcement that she will become the first ever female chief executive of Basketball ACT, officially replacing David Simpson on January 23.
The organisation's current general manager of operations landed the position by pitching her three-year strategic vision for basketball in the capital, and top of the list of issues she wants to address is the severe lack of indoor facilities which is negatively impacting the sporting community.
"It's significantly detrimental," Bowles told The Canberra Times.
"Our clubs are turning people away by the hundreds every year, because our clubs just aren't able to train and provide facilities.
"It's not just us from a competition delivery front, it's being able to provide a suitable and safe playing environment for our basketball clubs to be able to participate in training."
In the last two years at Basketball ACT, Bowles has been involved at every level of the game and has detailed insight into where more progress can be made.
Bowles painted a dire picture of what families and players endure in the ACT basketball community.
Clubs with four teams training on a single court because that's all they have access to at suitable times for kids, and on weekends games are played from 8am until 10pm due to the indoor venue shortage.
Despite this, the sport in the ACT is booming, as it is nationally, helped by more male and female Australian basketballers than ever making a name for themselves internationally - with the irony being that many will pass through Basketball Australia or NBA Global Academy programs at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra en route to such stardom.
Not even COVID-19 could slow down ACT basketball's "significant growth" in the last two years, Bowles said. But there just aren't enough courts to satiate such demand.
"We currently utilise nine courts as competition standard within the ACT, and we desperately need more," she said.
"That's what we're talking to government about - building and investing in indoor facilities so that we're able to have people playing and training within the Canberra community at reasonable time slots.
"We are growing at a substantial rate, so we need to make sure that we've got really strong structures and support in place for our clubs as well."
With the situation as it is, Bowles said while they would naturally like to see the Canberra Cannons back in the NBL to complement the Canberra Capitals in the WNBL, it's just not a priority for Basketball ACT at the moment.
"We wouldn't walk away from that, but in terms of our focus, as an organisation that's something that we're not deep diving into at this stage," she said.
"But there's a great appetite for an NBL team. Canberra is a very passionate basketball community, so if we were to secure a franchise locally, then they definitely would be supported strongly."
It could be argued that no matter the support for the Cannons to return to the NBL however, the indoor venue crisis in the ACT means Canberra just isn't ready for it.
Bowles welcomed the federal government's plans to fund the re-opening of AIS Arena by the end of 2023, but the Capitals' logistical nightmare last season while the venue was closed indefinitely highlighted the severity of the facilities issue.
That one major indoor venue closing unfairly strained grassroots basketball while also impacting the elite level.
"When the AIS wasn't up and running, we needed to have discussions with the Caps around being able to play at one of our venues, which then impacts our competitions," Bowles explained.
"We're obviously more than willing to do that for them, but that then has flow-on effects to us."
Under Bowles' leadership Basketball ACT plan to go hard at government, continuing "positive discussions" to secure necessary funding and finally see their Belconnen indoor centre built where there is currently "a lovely patch of dirt".
They have the land, they have done the feasibility study and the planning, all they need now is the money to get work underway.
"We've got a really great project that's ready to go," Bowles said.
"That's been in the pipeline, and we've had that land for over 10 years now.
"To be able to deliver a facility on that land would be absolutely amazing for the sport and Belconnen is the key corridor for us in terms of our participants and community.
"Once we secure that, we will be in a really great position as a sport."
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