Congratulations to all Norths officials on a fantastic season, both on and off the court. In our first full season following two years of COVID restrictions, it’s been great to see such a superb performance put out on court. We have seen some great improvement in many of our officials, and this has resulted in significant appointments across the board.

Our technical officials program continues to thrive both locally and on an international level. A massive thank you to Daniel Licayan, Daniel Giffney, and Emma Claus who have looked after our Statisticians all year, and Roupen Zarigian who has looked after our Scoretable officials. Your hard work and commitment is always appreciated. The growth of our program can only come with such great support as well as the dedication of all of our technical officials on Norths Premier League, Waratah League, NBL1, WNBL, and NBL. Congratulations to the following officials who were appointed to games at the Waratah Leagues/NBL1 finals weekend.

· Michael Sainsbury – WYM Semi Final, WM Semi Final, WM Grand Final (Clock)

· Troy Manjikian – WM Semi Final, NBL1 Men Semi Final, WM Grand Final (Shot clock)

· Yomwana Bradford – Wheelchair Men Semi Final and Grand Final, WYW Grand Final (Chair)

· Nikita Bradford - NBL1 Women Semi Final, NBL1 Men Semi Final, NBL1 Men Grand Final (Caller)

A further congratulations to Daniel Licayan, Roupen Zarigian, Jayme Debnam (Formerly Norths, now Southern Districts, QLD), Emma Claus (Hills), Alannah Stokes (Manly), Ros Graham (Hills), Helen Budd (Hills), who are selected to attend the FIBA Women’s World Cup in Sydney as Technical Officials. This is an incredible opportunity, and we wish them the best of luck.

A massive thank you to all referees who officiated on our Junior Representative games throughout the year and an extra special thank you to Paul Buttsworth for looking after these days and guiding our junior officials through the many challenges throughout the year. Your hard work and commitment is greatly appreciated.

For our Junior Representative program this year we had many new officials step onto the court for the first time and also had many returning faces. Overall, we had 104 Junior Representative home games this season with 40 officials referee and of these, the following officials received finals appointments from Basketball NSW.

Our Senior Representative program continued to excel across the board with 8 officials nominated at the beginning of the season, which grew to 11 by the end of the season with the promotion of Jake Jennings, Louis Brockwell, and Jason Martinez onto the Waratah League panel. This was as a result of their determination and perseverance to improve and excel.

2022 also saw the ‘retirement’ of 2 Norths Senior League Referees. Norths Referee Development Officer, Brendan Lloyd retired after 10 years on the Waratah league/NBL1 panels and went out in style refereeing Australian basketball GOAT Lauren Jackson when she came to the bear cave.

Sadly, the second referee to hang out the whistle was Norths home grown FIBA referee and ex-RDO, Guy Richards. Guy had an incredibly successful junior refereeing career and continued this success on the senior league. Guy earned his FIBA license in 2019 after many years on the WNBL and NBL panels and was selected to referee the WNBL finals series in 2019, 2020, and 2022, as well as refereeing at many international tournaments in the Oceania region. Guy has always shown true determination to excel and has been an incredible role model for many officials throughout his career and will be dearly missed. We thank you Guy, for all you have contributed to the game.

The inaugural season of NBL1 saw the appointment of Norths Referee, Jonathon Parkinson, as the NBL1 East Program Manager and he did an excellent job in managing this often challenging task throughout the year. Congratulations to Jonathan an incredibly successful first year.

We also saw the appointment of 7 officials onto the NBL1 panel, as well as Riannan De La Torre as a Referee Instructor. The following officials were rewarded for their success across the year with appointments to the Waratah League/NBL1 Final series at Hills Basketball Stadium.

· Luke Joseph – NBL1 Women Semi Final, NBL1 Women Grand Final

· Brad Mattioli - NBL1 Women Semi Final, NBL1 Women Grand Final

· Jayden Krieg – Waratah League Men Semi Final

· Oliver Toon – Waratah Youth League Men 2 Semi Final, Waratah Youth League Men 2 Grand Final

A massive congratulations to Luke Joseph who has also been selected as one of 5 Basketball NSW officials, and one of 18 Referees nationwide, to attend the NBL1 National Finals in Melbourne, August 9th-11th. This is a fantastic achievement and is the result of all the hard work that Luke has put in over the years.

Norths would like to congratulate all our officials on the phenomenal year, and we look forward to seeing each of you grow and come back even stronger in 2023.