If not for an untimely break, Otago White Fern and Tall Fern Suzie Bates could have taken a different sporting path, Suzanne McFadden discovers in part 3 of our On Your Mark series, taking Commonwealth Games athletes back to high school.
Suzie Bates is a rare breed.
She’s played basketball at the Olympics and is about to play cricket at the Commonwealth Games. But did she come close to playing rugby at those lofty heights, too?
At Otago Girls' High School, a sports-mad Bates threw herself into every code that had a tournament to travel to - her prerequisite before she’d sign up.
Those sports included cricket and basketball, volleyball and touch. And then there was rugby, where she played in the school backline alongside Black Ferns Sevens Olympic champion Kelly Brazier.
“I don’t know if sevens would have been for me - I wasn’t quite quick enough,” Bates says. Even though she’s hailed as one of the best fielders in international cricket, holding the record for most catches in a series (20, incidentally).
“But I loved rugby. I was a big girl for my age, so I charged through the midfield. I always wondered later in life, when I was fitter, how I’d go playing rugby again. But there’s always the fear of being injured.”
Her rugby career ended prematurely when she broke her collarbone – playing basketball – and she never picked up an oval ball again. “So my mum was really happy,” laughs Bates, Otago Girls’ High head girl in 2005.
But she’s stayed in touch with Brazier, Otago Girls' 13th Olympian, following her dazzling career closely.
“Every time we play cricket at the Mount, she brings a few of the Black Ferns Sevens girls along,” Bates says. “It would be awesome to play at the same tournament as Kelly for the first time.”
When the Black Ferns Sevens team for the Commonwealth Games is named next week, Brazier – a Black Fern for 13 years and a four-time World Cup winner - is almost certain to be among them.
Who could forget the 2018 Commonwealth Games sevens final on the Gold Coast, where Brazier scored an 80-metre runaway try in extra time to secure gold for her Black Ferns Sevens sisters.
Bates’ sporting career could have branched off in any direction.
“But it’s just that opportunities presented themselves which kind of directed my career,” the former White Ferns captain says. “Who would have thought cricket and basketball would provide these opportunities for me?”
Well, definitely not Bates’ science teacher.
“She told me to keep working hard because sport wasn’t a career,” she recalls.
“I was very fond of her, and to be fair at the time, the sports I was playing didn’t have a career path. She just wanted to make sure I still used my brain and got through high school and university.”
Which Bates did, with a Bachelor of Physical Education from the University of Otago, "which only took me six years."
But she’s grateful to the teachers and lecturers who kept her at her studies, while she was “distracted” by sport.
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Inside the gymnasium at Otago Girls’ High, four massive banners hang along one wall. Each bears a word exemplifying the school’s malaga (Samoan for journey), and below it, the image of a former student who went on to sporting greatness.
Dame Yvette Williams, Olympic gold medallist in the long jump and multiple Commonwealth Games medallist, represents 'Empower'.
“The cornerstone of our school is Yvette Williams,” says the acting head of physical education, Marcelle Clements. “She wasn’t our first Olympian [swimmer Kathleen Miller was in 1928] but Yvette was our first Olympic medallist.”
Kelly Brazier, Olympic and Commonwealth gold medallist, is 'Inspire'. “She was a very quiet, humble student here," Clements says. "But we just love her confidence on the field, and she's the embodiment of an inspiration to a wealth of girls."
Anna Frost, exceptional ultramarathon runner and Skyrunner world champion, is 'Dream'. She returned to the school as a relief teacher when Covid stopped her competing offshore. “We love Anna’s story, and her life-long journey in a not-traditional sport,” Clements says.
And Suzannah Bates, 2008 Olympian in basketball and undeniably one of the world’s best cricketers, wields the willow beneath the word 'Challenge'.
Bates, now 34, laughs whenever she sees her first name spelled out in full: “No one’s called me that in a long time.”
Still living in Dunedin, Bates visits the school often, invited back to talk to students. “I say: ‘Surely they’re sick of my voice’,” she says. “But they tell me there are new girls starting every year who haven’t heard from me yet.”
One day last week, she walked into the school gym where a Year 10 class was doing PE. “Two of the kids – who aren’t our sporty kids – asked ‘Oh my god, is that Suzie Bates?’” says Clements. “They were like ‘Wow she’s actually here!’
“She’s a role model, and was even when she was in the classroom, without actively seeking leadership. That’s why we chose her for our gym wall.
“She has a ripple effect across every walk of life in our school – it’s not just our top sporting athletes. At yesterday’s library day we had to dress up as our Matariki future stars, but there was one kid with her Suzie Bates-signed cricket T-shirt on and her cap looking just like Suzie.”
Bates knows so well the importance of young women meeting their role models, who were once schoolgirls like them.
There’s the famous story of Bates in Year 9 at Otago Girls', meeting Olympic gold medallist cyclist Sarah Ulmer when she came to the school as part of the New Zealand Olympic Committee’s ambassador programme – and the lasting effect it had on the young Bates.
“She was so cool and down-to-earth with us - she seemed so normal,” she says of Ulmer. “She got us to write down really big goals. To dream big and not be ashamed of those dreams.”
Bates wrote that she wanted to play cricket and basketball for New Zealand. Today she’s an NZOC ambassador.
“I always remember that moment when I go back into schools, that you have the potential to do that for some young sporty kids. It’s pretty cool I’m on the other side now,” she says.
Bates shares the love around other schools in Dunedin. Last year, she was at Kavanagh College to announce student Erika Fairweather was going to swim at the Olympics. And she’s helped to coach the First XI cricket team at St Hilda’s Collegiate School.
“I get a bit of stick for helping out St Hilda’s, but they have a very strong cricket team, and my arm was twisted,” she says. “They’ve produced a lot of [Otago] Sparks and now a White Fern in Eden Carson.”
Carson, who’s 20, is one of two rookies named in the White Ferns to play T20 at the Commonwealth Games next month. Bates also coached her in the Otago U15s for two years and knew straight off the bat the spinner was something special.
“I always remember she had a bit about her when she bowled 10 overs into the wind on a really windy day - and she was the most competitive player in our team by far,” Bates says.
“She’s from Ranfurly and my dad was born in Ranfurly, so there’s a nice connection. And I’m so stoked for her.”
Bates still has a “great connection” with Otago Girls. She goes out for coffee with the school’s sports co-ordinator, Colleen Hokianga, whose daughter played basketball with Bates.
“I remember the little girl with pigtails who started here. She was so cute,” Hokianga says.
The school’s philosophy around getting girls playing sport and being active is having to constantly evolve, Hokianga says. “We know these are challenging times for our students, so we're listening to them more to see what they want from sport. We no longer push just the traditional sports, we have to embrace what they want to do," she says.
“It’s getting harder to encourage them to celebrate their successes, some are a bit shy about that. And we try to get them away from their cellphones and encourage them into physical activity. We’re understanding girls want to be active but in different ways than they ever have before.”
It's obvious the school – and the rest of Otago - are succeeding. For the second year running, the region came out top in the national census of secondary school sport participation in 2021. Otago’s participation rate for teenagers is 63 percent compared to the national average of 49 percent, and those figures are virtually the same for Otago girls involved in sport.
Otago Girls’ offers 32 sports to their 700 students – including fencing and curling. “We were national curling champions a few years ago – not bad for a city school near the beach,” Clements says.
One of the most popular sports at the moment is badminton – the school has 11 teams in the Otago competition and another six who stay after schools on Friday for social games.
“We’re now taking away the word ‘trial’ which is a barrier for some girls who don’t want to be competitive and just want to play in a team with their friends,” Hokianga says. “Enjoyment is a huge part of it.”
Otago Girls' High senior A volleyball team won their local championship last season.
There is no high performance programme at Otago Girls'. “I don’t like academies,” says Hokianga. “They’re school kids - let them enjoy what they do without putting immense pressure on them. They get enough of that with NCEA.
“Our top athletes can apply to the Otago Academy of Sport which has a high performance programme. This year has been a bumper year – we have six girls in the programme.”
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If Bates had taken up a basketball scholarship to an American college straight out of high school, she would have had a very different path – and would probably have ended up teaching back at Otago Girls’.
American basketballer Leonard King, who was playing for the Otago Nuggets, helped mould a young Bates’ game and put her in touch with some US colleges.
But White Ferns coach Steve Jenkin got wind of her plans and immediately selected her for the White Ferns at just 18. “He got me in the team a bit earlier than planned,” she says. “Once I played international cricket, I was hooked. But had Steve not picked me I could have never played cricket again.”
But the decision to stay home actually worked out well for her basketball career.
“By not going to America I stayed in the New Zealand basketball system, so I was really lucky to be in the selectors faces when the Beijing Olympics opportunity came around,” Bates says.
It was also a deviation from her path to becoming a PE teacher. “I couldn’t commit to a whole year of study. So it kept being put on the back burner which was a shame,” she says.
“I’m going to talk to Eden [Carson] because she’s in her final year of vet study. I know a [fulltime] cricket contract is exciting, but I have my wiser hat on, and I’m going to tell her to get her studies done now because it’s really hard to go back to.”
Bates’ sister, Olivia (who played netball for Southern Steel), is a school teacher in Dunedin. “Maybe when I don’t have sport to play it might be an option too,” the elder Bates says.
While Clements has encouraged Bates to join her in teaching, she’s now had second thoughts. “She could potentially be wasted as a teacher because her vision and ability to lead is much more global than that,” Clements says. “Her talents lie in her ability to get a collective of people together for the benefit and wellbeing of all women. Internationally.”
But neither of those options are on her near horizon. Bates isn’t ready to stop playing cricket at the highest level yet.
She’s not calling it ‘unfinished business’. Yes, this year’s World Cup was devastating, and she still has “bipolar feelings” about it – from the joy of playing on home soil to the heartbreak of narrowly missing the semifinals.
“A memory I’ll never forget was at Eden Park against England when we got the ninth wicket runout - we sprinted across the field and the crowd was going absolutely nuts. And I genuinely thought we were going to win it,” Bates says.
“It was one of the greatest games of cricket I’ve been a part of. But having lost and knowing our World Cup was over was hard to believe.
“We had three close games that went to the last over and under pressure, we weren’t good enough. But I think what I’ll remember looking back in time was the genuine support from the whole of New Zealand. I don’t feel like I’ve ever been so supported as a White Ferns cricketer. And people genuinely enjoyed the cricket.”
Bates was always going to reassess her career after the World Cup. “And with the Comm Games being so close, I thought ‘Why not get amongst it?’
“With the young players and a new coach I feel invigorated again. I had a big break with my shoulder injury and then Covid, and I know once I’m done, I’m a long time retired. I still love it as much as ever and my body is still doing the right things.
“And there are so many exciting things coming up I can’t say no to them right now.”
