Youth basketball is shifting its focus to schools in the Cayman Islands.
The KPMG 14 and Under Basketball League gets under way this week. Put on by the Cayman Islands Basketball Association, matches will take place indoors between the Triple C school hall and the University College of the Cayman Islands multipurpose hall.
Technical Director for Cayman basketball Victor ‘Voot’ O’Garro states the competition has a fresh agenda.
“This (the U14 competition) is nothing new but this league is new because we’re going through the schools,” O’Garro said. “We’ve never done that before and this is where we really wanted to go.”
The competition features three schools in John Gray High, Clifton Hunter High and Triple C and six teams in the boys and girls divisions. The league opener is on Tuesday, 24 January, featuring the boys as JG Marlin Academy battle Clifton Hunter Sharks at 3.15pm while JG Tarpon Academy tackle Triple C at 4.15pm at UCCI.
O’Garro states more schools were approached to take part in the competition but they opted to do their own thing.
“We wanted to have all of the schools involved. But the private schools have a tournament already organized. Thus we ended up using the John Gray and Clifton Hunter campuses along with Triple C.
“Interestingly, we found that a lot of the kids coming from East End and North Side don’t play basketball so that tells us (as an association) that we have to grow basketball in the Eastern districts.”
Indeed the Private School Association does have its own calendar of sporting events for 2012. A mini-basketball league started last Thursday and runs until 16 February.
That competition is part of a larger Interscholastic Sports League designed for middle and high school students at association member institutions Cayman International School, Cayman Prep, St. Ignatius, Triple C, Cayman Academy, Wesleyan Christian Academy and Grace Christian Academy. Other sports being included are netball, football, volleyball, athletics and swimming.
O’Garro states the result is that athletes in the public schools will shine in the KPMG competition.
“Three will be some girls who play for Redver Ebanks (and his Women of Valour team). But there will be a lot of new players in this league. This is the way we really wanted to go. Depending on how this works out, we might go this way for the Under 16 league while keeping the U19 league outside of school.”
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