health

The 23 y/o who left everything behind to come and play sport in Australia.

Kathleen playing basketball

 

Imagine growing up in a small town in Missouri, America.

You dream about playing basketball. All you want to do is get into the professional leagues – but you’re not sure how to get there.

And yet by the time you’re 23, you’re playing professional basketball in Australia.

That’s the reality for Kathleen Scheer – one of the incredibly talented American girls that has come to Australia to take part in our basketball teams. She started out with Bendigo, played with the Hobart Lady Chargers for awhile, and is now a forward for the Sydney Flames.

We’ve got some truly remarkable international players across our Aussie teams, and it’s time that we celebrate some of their successes.

I asked Kathleen to tell us a bit more about her story and how she got to be in Australia, all the way from Missouri…

I grew up playing basketball. The town that I grew up in – New Haven – was a massive sports community, and basketball was the biggest. All my cousins played and my brothers played. I think that being the only girl with 4 brothers pushed me to really start taking basketball seriously.

My brothers have always pushed me to do my very best and I’m definitely grateful for it. They made me tough and made me love the game even more.

I went to university at Duke and had to balance studying and basketball. It was tough – it definitely taught me the importance of time management. Having to go to workouts, class, study hall, more class, and then practice some days was demanding, but it helped me grow heaps and looking back I wouldn’t have had it any other way.

After my last basketball season in college in American, I knew I wanted to play professional basketball. I contacted my cousin, Luke Meyer, who used to play for the Bendigo Braves in the SEABL, and simply asked him for some advice. He ended up contacting someone he knew in Bendigo and I ended up signing with the Spirit.

Unfortunately, I was only with them for a few weeks because of an injury, but I came back when I was healthy and played in the SEABL for Hobart. That gave me some exposure for the WNBL and now I’m in Sydney!

I love Australia. The people are welcoming and very helpful. It’s absolutely beautiful wherever you go. But I do miss home everyday! I am very close to my family and my community back home. It is hard not being there for birthdays, holidays, and weddings. Thank goodness for Skype!

Kathleen

A normal day for me includes waking up and eating breakfast that normally consists of scrambled eggs. I head to the gym to lift weights and do conditioning. We lift lower body twice a week and upper body once a week. Our conditioning varies. We may go outside and run, or stay inside and use the bikes, rowing machines, and ellipticals. We swim sometimes as well. After that, I come home; eat lunch, which usually is a wrap of some kind and sleep. In the afternoon, I go to training on court. It last about 2 hours. We get shots up, scrimmage, and work on things that we need to improve.

I think we need to get more women interested in basketball, and start early by getting young girls interested in sports. When I was little, I knew I wanted to play NCAA basketball and play professionally. I looked up to the women who were doing just that. I wanted to do what they were doing when I was all grown up.

If we get girls interested in sports at a young age, we give them something to push towards. They need to understand that the sky is the limit. They can achieve anything they put their mind to. I’m a small town Missouri girl living in Australia and playing professional basketball. I dreamt about this for as long as I can remember and now I’m living it.

For anyone hoping to play basketball professionally, my advice to you is:  Work really hard. Get in the gym and work on your game and never stop. Dream big! Never be satisfied where you are at. Always push to be better.

And in other sports news from the week…

Sally Fitzgibbons surfing

– Sally Fitzgibbons won the Fiji Pro this week, which was another stop on the world championship surfing tour. It’s her second win in a row after winning the Brazil Pro a few weeks ago.

Sally managed to beat her fellow Aussie rival, Stephanie Gilmore, 9.00 points to Gilmore’s 8.73. The pair faced three-metre waves at Cloudbreak reef in Fiji – several other competitors snapped boards on the reef, and one even surfed with a broken wrist after hitting it on the shallow reef.

This win puts Sally in second place for the world championship title. You can go here to read about her journey to the top so far.

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– Despite our Australian women’s rugby team being ridiculously talented, coming in at second place in the world, they won’t get a chance to compete in the Commonwealth Games this year.

The Games are coming up in Glasgow in July – however, they don’t offer a competition slot for any female rugby team. The male teams have the competition slots.

“They say ‘stick to a girly sport, you don’t want to mess up a pretty face’,” Tiana Penitani told SBS News.

While rugby for both men and women will be included in the Rio Olympics in 2016, that’s not much consolation for the girls who are keen to get over to the Games now.

You can go here to read our interview with one of the players from our female Rugby Sevens team.

– The Matildas lost out to Japan in the grand final of the Asian Cup on Monday. They lost 1-0 loss to the world champion in Ho Chi Minh City. However, by reaching the semi-finals, Australia has qualified for the World Cup in Canada next year.

– Our women’s water polo team, the Aussie Stingers, managed a thrilling 7-5 victory over the USA in the gold medal final of the 2014 FINA World League Intercontinental Cup in Riverside, California. Congrats, ladies.

– Today is the first ever National Netball Day. Good luck to all netballers, young and old, out on the court today. Make sure you wear blue and get involved in whatever your association has planned.

Have you seen anything in the sporting world that you’d like to talk about?