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The Women’s National Wheelchair Basketball League gets underway this week, with an expanded competition that includes six teams.
Organisers are aiming for it to become more competitive in preparation for the 2032 Brisbane Paralympics.
Triple Paralympic medallist and co-founder of the Victorian Wonders’ Shelley Matheson started the team earlier this year with Paralympic teammate Leanne Del Toso.
She shared the story of the team’s journey with community radio’s current affairs show, the Wire.
Ms Matheson, says the team was formed from the ashes of a prior team which crumbled in the wake of COVID19.
The Victorian team had been strong in the league for a number of years…When COVID happened…the team fell over
Shelley Matheson
Undeterred she pushed on:
“We knew that there were women in Victoria that wanted to play sport…So we put together that Play On program with the intention in mind that we needed a Victorian women's wheelchair basketball team to play in the National League,” Ms Matheson says.
With both Paralympians putting pressure on clubs and associations around Victoria to house women's wheelchair basketball, Basketball Victoria ended up stepping in and committing to the sport for the next three years.
Ms Matheson says she wants the National Women’s team, the Gliders, to be successful in the lead up to hosting the 2032 Paralympic Games.
All of Australia will be watching. We need women's wheelchair basketball represented in that tournament so that the public can see it. We need to be back on the world stage by then.
Shelley Matheson
The three-time medallist believes young girls in Australia need to see themselves in team sport and know that's an option for them.
“I grew up in regional Victoria. I didn't see another disabled person until I was 13 years old. I don't want that for the next generation,” Ms Matheson says.
She advocates for an increase in teams to make the sport more local. Spending much of her time on the road travelling as a teenager due to most events being held in Metropolitan areas, The Victorian Wonders’ left the co-founder wanting less time in cars and more time on court for players today.
“I don't want people to have to travel three or four hours just to play basketball. I want them to have sporting opportunities in their backyard. Grassroots is super important because we just want everybody experiencing community connection,” she says.