Panthers and local Portlaoise schools gearing up for 2025 Jr. NBA Festival of Fun

PORTLAOISE Panthers Basketball Club and their partner schools - Holy Family Senior School, Scoil Bhríde Knockmay and Gaelscoil Phortlaoise - this week, discovered their affiliated NBA teams for next month’s Jr. NBA Festival of Fun in the National Basketball Arena.

While Holy Family have been paired with San Antonio Spurs, Scoil Bhríde have been matched up with the Los Angeles Clippers and Gaelscoil Phortlaoise have drawn Detroit Pistons.

Running since 2018, Basketball Ireland’s Junior NBA initiative is part of the official youth basketball participation programme of the NBA and is designed to provide a fun non-competitive introduction to the sport for young primary school children.

Each year Basketball Ireland selects 10 clubs from across the country who are subsequently paired with three schools in their locality in an effort to encourage and support youth basketball participation.

Panthers have been a driving force behind the huge growth of basketball in Portlaoise and the surrounding areas, working extensively with locals schools who themselves boast many students who compete for the club.

Caroline Duffy, a teacher in Holy Family Senior School and coach in Portlaoise Panthers, is delighted to see her school and club invited to compete in this year’s Junior NBA Festival of Fun, and is hopeful this opportunity will spark increased interest in the sport as the local schools begin to assemble their respective mixed squads for the upcoming event.

“The schools will be putting together teams for his Jr. NBA Festival of Fun and we try to be extensively inclusive,” Duffy told the *****Laois Nationalist*****. “I myself would run 3v3 tournaments and leagues within our school. You'd be encouraging children to come down to the club where they would have sessions organised for you to try it out and see if you want to join the club. You’d be encouraging them to take part.

“Last year our school took part in a blitz that was run by the Portarlington Primary School and we got a few matches going with different schools.

“So we'd be constantly trying to give them a flavour of basketball to see what the interest is like, and then, hopefully, they might join the club.

“Our school would be one of the biggest feeder schools for Panthers and then you’d also have Scoil Bhríde, Knockmay and then the Gaelscoil.

“With this Jr. NBA Festival of Fun, Basketball Ireland do try to change up the schools or the clubs every year to give that opportunity to as many different kids in the country as possible.

“Every year we have a blitz for sixth class and we usually run it in June, but because we've been given this opportunity we'll just start that a bit earlier,” she said.

Panthers have been spearheading the rapid growth of the sport in Portlaoise, helped no end by the fact that they currently field a team in the top echelons of Irish women’s basketball, Domino’s Super League, while the men line out in Division One and, this season, reached both the final of the league playoffs and the President’s National Cup.

Duffy believes the local schools need to capitalise on the growth in popularity of basketball by taking part in events like the upcoming Festival of Fun which offers participants the chance to experience playing at the National Basketball Arena in Tallaght.

“Some of them might never get an opportunity to play there again,” stressed Duffy. ”It’s like getting invited up to Croke Park, so for a lot of our kids it'll be a massive occasion.

“I mentioned it to them when we had applied because the interest in basketball is massive. It’s really going from strength to strength in the town.

“The club itself is very good to the kids in Portlaoise. We have very little facilities and we're putting an awful lot of effort into trying to get a completely new facility in the town, because what we have really isn't fit for purpose.

“The schools like St Mary CBS, Holy Family and Portlaoise College have been fantastic to the club by giving us their hall space whenever they possibly can to make sure that we can enter as many teams into competitions and accommodate as many kids as we possibly can,” she said.