GB Maxibasketball national performance programme moves to Nottingham Wildcats Arena — to the delight of coach Jimmy ‘Jumpshot’ Smith

A former Newark basketball coach says he is delighted that the Nottingham Wildcats Arena will become the primary training venue for the GB Maxibasketball national performance programme.

Coach Jimmy ‘Jumpshot’ Smith, who now heads the Great Britain Women’s 45-plus team, has welcomed the programme’s move ahead of the run-up to the European FIMBA Championships in Malaga, Spain, which begins on June 24.

The move means Great Britain Maxibasketball Women will be training at the purpose-built facility for their final three weekend camps beginning this weekend, in preparation for the big event.

Coach Smith’s GB Women 45+ team is coming off of a huge victory over the Royal Navy Women 55-36 and Smith is hoping that local women’s teams of all levels will offer to play friendly matches with GB’s four age group teams to help them prepare for the tournament.

Jimmy said: “It’s appropriate that we’ll be training on Pauline Prior Court.

“After all, it was Pauline who got me started in Coaching Women’s basketball when I was appointed as Nottingham Wildcats Coach in 1981-1984, succeeding John Jones who was their founding coach.

“It will be a privilege for me to coach on the court named in her honour.

“GB Maxis Women have four teams that all need matches to prepare for the Euros so the more offers of competition we get, the better prepared we will be.

“It also gives women’s teams in the East Midlands area the opportunity to play in a first-class facility and to get to know our programme, which began in 2019.”

Jimmy, who has pioneered the game at multiple levels in the UK over the past 45 years, is once again in a developmental role in the newest initiative in Basketball England, Basketball Wales and Basketball Scotland’s talent pathway working under GB Maxis women coaching director ‘CJ’ Lee and programme coordinator Sadie Mason.

Arena manager Jez King said: “We hope that the facilities and services on offer at the arena provides the necessary training environment required to maximise the opportunity for success for all those involved in GB Maxibasketball over the next two years, and we are really looking forward to becoming a long-term service provider.”

We are delighted to announced that the Nottingham Wildcats Arena (NWA) is set to become the primary training venue for the GB Maxibasketball national performance programme in preparation for the XI FIMBA EUROPEAN CHAMPIONSHIP MALAGA 2022 later this year and the World Championships in Orlando in 2023.

The Arena Manager, Jez King said: “As a premium purpose-built basketball facility, we are excited to be able to support the “Talent Pathway” by working with national level squads once again.

"The arena was originally designed and built in 2001 to provide basketball players and coaches of all ability levels and ages with the opportunity to develop on a local, regional, and national scale, and in so doing aid the growth of the sport in the UK.

"We hope that the facilities and services on offer at the arena provides the necessary training environment required to maximise the opportunity for success for all those involved in GB Maxibasketball over the next 2 years, and we are really looking forward to becoming a long-term service provider of the programme”

GB Maxibasketball’s Camp Coordinator, Emma Parslow, who has successfully managed the procurement of additional camp facilities to cater for the growth in participant numbers since December 2020, when the programme was included in the Basketball England Talent Pathway, said:

‘As a programme with players and staff traveling from all nations in the UK (and some from the USA), it’s important for us to ensure high quality training facilities are centrally located and accessible to everyone. Nottingham Arena offers this, along with excellent performance support facilities that are consistently available to us throughout the year.”

The NWA is well-embedded in its local community, hosting school-aged ballers, as well as the national league and WBBL teams.

With the addition of the GB Maxibasketball programme, it can now proudly boast an ability to cater for all ages and levels: from Mini to Maxi and from beginners to national team performance level. We trust that GB Maxis’ Nottingham-based coach, Jimmy Jumpshot Smith will be first to arrive at camp and to welcome us to his patch/

The GB Maxibasketball programme will retain a presence in Sheffield and Manchester from time to time, as and when facilities are available, but we look forward to being in Nottingham from April 2022. 🇬🇧🏀🇬🇧