Heelers break down barriers
WA has a new wheel deal on the national sporting stage.
The State's most eclectic team, with a social conscience to boot, has finally been accepted into the National Wheelchair Basketball League after a protracted bid.
Boasting a church minister, a legal secretary, amputees, spina bifida sufferers and a smattering of Paralympians, the Perth-based Red Dust Heelers have made a double-edged pledge to put their team on the national map.
Brad Ness, co-founder and captain of the Australian Rollers, said the Heelers were determined to play hard against the nation's best teams and support young indigenous people with disabilities and others facing hardship.
"We're using wheelchair basketball because everyone can have a crack and it breaks down barriers," he said. "We'd love to win a championship but our catchphrase is trying to accelerate economic freedom and driving health and wellbeing."
Basketball Australia's decision to include the mixed-gender Heelers despite opposition from rivals gives WA two teams.
The Perth Wheelcats won the title in September and the Heelers were forced to merge with Adelaide's Thunder.
BA chief executive Anthony Moore believes having a well- credentialed second team from WA would enhance basketball pathways and strengthen the Rollers and the women's Gliders.
"The feedback is that it is vital to the high performance of our Rollers and Gliders," he said. "It adds another high-calibre team to the competition.
"We've got four national teams and, right now, only one is a back-to-back World Champion and that's the Rollers. We're all striving for that with the Boomers, Opals, Rollers and Gliders and our paralympians are as important as the able-bodied side."
Mr Moore said the Heelers had a huge reputation for what they were striving for on and off the court.
Ness, whose right foot was torn off in a freak 1992 ferry accident at Rottnest, has captained the Rollers to the past two World Championships.
He said the Heelers concept was inspired by indigenous business and wellbeing venture Outback Academy at the team's "spiritual home" at Roelands Village, near Collie in the South West.
Also linked with the Eastern States Red Dust Healing program, Ness said he and the Heelers were finding new strength.
He said he now forgets about his own disability as he watches the efforts of teammates.
"My incident was pretty horrific but to watch some of them, you sort of forget your own mishap," Ness said.
Heelers captain Ryan Morich, 21, of Karratha, whose left leg was amputated at age 12 because of a rare bone cancer, recently became the first indigenous Australian with a disability to take a US college sports scholarship.
He said the Heelers were a big part of his journey, which he hoped would result in him playing for Australia.
"It's great to represent my culture," he said. "I hope I can inspire other young indigenous Australians and others with a disability to give anything a go."
Kathleen O'Kelly-Kennedy, who won bronze with the Gliders at the Beijing Paralympics, will move from Melbourne to Perth, where she recently lived for three years, to join the Heelers and return to the WA Rowing Club.
She said the rowing club was one of the most "inclusive" bodies she had found since her right foot was amputated as an infant.
The Heelers will cover some cost for rivals to help offset travel.
First game is against the Wollongong Rollerhawks in Dandenong on May 23 before three home games in Cockburn.
