BRISBANE (FIBA U15 Oceania Championship) – The Women's U15 of Samoa team is holding a training camp in Brisbane in preparation for the upcoming FIBA U15 Oceania Championship in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea on December 4-8.

Head Coach June Tahata welcomed 12 players to Brisbane and started their camp this week while taking 3-a-day sessions of two hours each with a detailed program to get them ready in time for the tournament.

Photo: Developing plays during the morning session

"Preparation has been a big success so far, right down to the team working behind the scenes. The girls are getting taken care of which has enabled us to get in there and train hard both physically and mentally," said Tahata.

"From nutrition, eating right, proper stretching, recovery, sleeping and on the court; perfecting the fundamentals and a lot of strategic stuff with a lot of repetition and building our culture of hard work;" she proudly added.

The team has called the Sleeman Sports Complex Chandler their home the past week and have been sleeping together in one room. The atmosphere of sharing everything has given a strong sense of familial feeling in their presence.

Photo: Question and Answer forum with former Opals member, Annie LaFleur

FIBA Oceania Development Manager Annie La Fleur visited the team at the request of Tahata to talk to the girls and inspire them in their upcoming battles.

"June invited me to speak to the girls, and we went in during lunch and caught a glimpse of their training. The elite level of training camp surprised me and also had impressive talent on the floor," said La Fleur a former Opals player and silver medalist in the 2000 Sydney Olympics.

"They got some good shooters and a little bit of size, and I am looking forward to watching them play next week in PNG," she added.

After the morning session the team went up to a common room, and during lunch, La Fleur spoke to the girls and also had a question and answer forum.

"The talk was fantastic and amazing the girls were really into it, and the amount of respect and admiration they showed was unbelievable. The sincerity of their questions and eagerness for answers was very impressive for 13, 14 and 15-year-old kids," said La Fleur a former WNBA player for the Washington Mystics and Minnesota Lynx.

Photo: The team hugging their coach after their traditional dance performance

After the talk, the team surprised La Fleur and the FIBA contingent with a traditional Samoa dance that reduced Tahata and La Fleur to tears.

"These girls are so special," Tahata said with her eyes welling up with pride. "They listen and buy into everything that I am trying to teach them. They treat me with a lot of respect, and I treat them with the same respect. They surprised me on how prepared they are to work hard, and nobody here quits. We're just continuously shining the little diamonds, and we believe we are going to get Top-2, we believe we got what it takes!" Tahata shared proudly.

Despite the tough road ahead and a less than ideal set up in preparing for the competition, Tahata, and the U15 Samoan team believes that they will achieve their goal of a Top-2 finish.

"The expectations and goals of the team is to get the Top-2 and compete against Australia and New Zealand," shared Tahata, who also coached the U18 Samoa team in the FIBA Women's U18 Asian Championship in India last month.

Photo: Traditional Samoa performance from the U15 Samoa Women's team

Reminded of a Top 4 finish can also qualify them to the Division B, Tahata quickly cut off this interviewer and said, "We want to make history, and we have a goal to put Samoa in the map, and that is to finish in the Top 2."

With less than a week of preparation and the games coming up, the tall order of trying to break the stranglehold of Oceania's traditional powerhouse teams Australia, New Zealand and the continuous improvement of the Pacific nations; Samoa will have tough work cut out for them.

But the level of commitment to the goal, to each other, and belief in themselves is an excellent step in the right direction, it's up to the team to take the leap.

"It's just a blessing to be part of such an amazing movement with 12 amazing women that strive for greatness and to be better every day. It touches my heart, and I've cried every day watching them pour their hearts out, day in, day out, night in and night out. We are so excited to play in PNG next week and ready to show what Women's Samoa basketball ball is all about," Tahata ended.

FIBA