Opals glory gives Tess confidence for WNBL season Madgen all fired up

TOWNSVILLE Fire recruit Tess Madgen says she couldn’t have asked for a better preparation for the upcoming WNBL season after Australia’s success at the FIBA Women’s World Cup.

Madgen ( pictured) proudly showed off her silver medal as she arrived back in Townsville yesterday after helping the Opals to their best World Cup result since 2006.

She will now turn her attention to the Fire’s WNBL title defence and she said she was ready to start cramming with just 10 days until their season opener against Dandenong.

Madgen proved during the World Cup that she’s fine being thrown in the deep end after switching to point guard when Leilani Mitchell was a late scratching through injury.

It was also Madgen’s first major tournament since suffering a serious knee injury in 2017, but she said coach Sandy Brondello’s fast- paced style made it easy to adapt.

“Sandy’s style of basketball is very up tempo and kicking the ball up the floor so that really helped me as a point guard,” Madgen said.

“She just wanted a very free- flowing game so it wasn’t a facilitating role as such, but obviously I was going there to do whatever the team needed.

“I’m lucky I’ve played point guard in the WNBL for many years so it wasn’t what I was expecting, but I was happy with how I was able to do that.”

Madgen, 28, said just the experience of training and playing with the Opals had been a nice confidence boost ahead of her WNBL comeback.

“It is quite surreal to have even gone to the World Cup and then to win the silver medal is just the icing on the cake,” she said.

“It gives me huge confidence in my knee knowing that I’m still physically able to compete against the best players in the world.”

Madgen is expected to make her first appearance in Fire colours in Sunday afternoon’s practice match against the Heat under- 23 men’s team at the Townsville Basketball Stadium.

It will be the Fire’s last hitout before next weekend’s season opener against Dandenong and Madgen was confident she’ll be ready to go.

“I’ll just see how my body’s recovering and I’ll talk to Claudia ( Brassard, head coach), but that’s the plan to play a little bit in that game,” Madgen said.

“I’ll get nice and recovered mentally and physically and then I’ll be raring to go for Townsville.”