Youth League Coaches Announced

Basketball Ballarat is pleased to announce that Grace Bibby and Kyle Slack will be leading the Ballarat Miners Youth League Women and Men respectfully.

Bibby joins the Ballarat Miners Youth League Women after her first season coaching the inaugural Bacchus Marsh Women’s CBL team and has had previous stints with Maryborough, Stawell, and our very own Junior Miners Program.

Bibby said “I am excited to be back involved in the Ballarat Program. I loved my time here as a junior player and coaching VJBL a few years ago.”

Bibby added, “It’s great to see those girls I coached then are still playing and vying for spots in the Youth League team.”

Bibby finished with “I am looking forward to the challenge of coaching at a higher level and I can't wait to work with Dave Herbert, his assistant coaches, and the Basketball Ballarat team to continue to grow the women’s program and also as an individual.”

Senior Elite Teams committee member Peter Cummingham said “It is great to have Grace join the Miners coaching panel working closely with Miners head coach David Herbet, Grace is a young enthusiastic emerging coach that has also progressed through the Ballarat JET programs and has been developing her philosophy and coaching skills in recent years and we are pleased to offer her this opportunity to continue this development and look forward to her addition to the coaching team.”

Meanwhile, Slack will step up from his assistant coach role with the Ballarat Miners Youth League Men in 2021 and take the Head Coach reigns.

2021 saw the Ballarat Miners Youth League Men sitting 5th in their pool after 10 games when the season was cut short due to covid-19 lockdowns.

Slack said “I’m really happy to be back with the Miners program this year and stoked to be able to take on the Head Coach position. We are forming a really solid squad with a lot of exciting young talent so to have the opportunity to coach and develop this team is a huge opportunity that I can’t wait to jump into”

Slack added, “Last year was a tough year with covid however the squad was still able to have some really good success throughout the year and we will look to build upon that in 2022.”

Senior Elite Teams Committee Member Matt Sheehan said, “We were really impressed with Kyle in his first year within our program.”

Despite an interrupted 2021 season, the Youth League Miners Men had a great start to the season and we’re on track to make finals before the season was cancelled.

Sheehan added, “As last year’s assistant coach Kyle has a great repour with our players and program and we look forward to him building on this with the team having success after two interrupted seasons.”

The Big V Youth League fixture was announced this week and both the Men and Women’s team will play away in round 1 before playing their first game at Selkirk Stadium on Saturday, March 26 with the Women taking on Altona at 6:00 pm and the Men taking on Keilor at 8:00 pm