The push for women and girls to become active in sports is a campaign that transcends across all clubs and sports.
In the run up to ‘Women in sport’ week, North-West basketball club, North Star Warriors, have given their support to an international campaign aimed at developing the sport of basketball for women and girls.
The 'Her World, Her Rules' campaign is a global initiative aimed at promoting the sport among young girls and women.
It aims to increase participation levels; recognise and promote women role models; and to ultimately, celebrate women’s basketball.
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North Star Warriors Chairman, Colum O’Neill, said the local club were ‘delighted’ to support what he described as a 'worthy cause.'
He said: "Since we recently relaunched our basketball club here in the North West, we have been keen to ensure that we are encouraging as many young girls as possible to take up the sport. To date, we have been amazed at the positive response with numbers at our girls training sessions growing steadily every week across all age groups."
As part of the campaign, North Star Warriors have been giving out HWHR merchandise such as basketballs and t-shirts at weekly training sessions to the club’s young players and have also invited special guest coaches who have excelled in Woman’s basketball to share their wisdom with the new wave of young girls taking up the sport.
On Sunday, March 5, the club welcomed Irish international underage players: Maria Kealy and Emma Gribben, who currently play in the woman’s Super league for Ulster Elks.
Colum O Neill said the club were elated to welcome the talented athletes to the North West.
He said: "We are so grateful to Maria and Emma for giving up their time to come to Derry to inspire the next generation of woman’s basketball.
"It’s important that our young players get to see, and meet positive, sports role models. Hopefully initiatives like this help to increase the numbers of girls & woman participating in sport overall."
The HWHR campaign was launched by The International Basketball Federation, FIBA, which is the association of national organisations which governs international competition in basketball. FIBA has made Women in Basketball a key focus of their strategic priorities for 2019-2023.
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