James Hargest student makes the big time in basketball
News of Mac Stodart making a national basketball team broke when he was in class at James Hargest College.
His mother, Maria Alcock, a teacher at the college, saw the email first and made a swift visit to Mac’s classroom.
‘‘She put her head in the door and gave me the thumbs up,’’ he said.
‘‘I was very excited and a bit shocked.’’
Mac is the only Southlander in the New Zealand under 16 men’s basketball team and follows fellow James Hargest student Tom Cowie who played in the side last year.
Cowie is now in the Southland Sharks team.
Mac, aged 15 and 2m tall, attended a two day South Island training camp at Ashburton in October.
He was then one of 80 selected for a national camp in Auckland in December.
Four more monthly camps were held in Auckland and as each one finished, participant numbers reduced.
Basketball New Zealand nounced the team in April.
Mac now makes two trips a month to Auckland for training, as part of the team’s build up to the Australian Junior Championships in Perth on July 8-15.
Each state of Australia is rep- an- resented at the prestigious tournament.
It will be held in Perth’s newest arena, the Warwick Stadium.
Mac is receiving highperformance training in Auckland.
‘‘It’s a lot faster and they talk a lot more on defense,’’ said Mac, who also trains with the Southland Sharks.
Wellington Saints coach Kevin Braswell noticed Mac’s talent several years ago and coached him for 18 months.
At the time, Braswell was the Southland Basketball Association’s development officer and a game-breaker for the Sharks.
Mac has played basketball since 2010 and represented Southland at age-group level for the past four years.
His eagerness to learn and get better, impresses the current development officer Dan Peck.
‘‘He’s gifted in terms of size and athleticism,’’ Peck said.
‘‘The sky’s the limit if he continues to learn and develop.’’
In March, Mac was second in discus and third in javelin at the South Island secondary schools’ athletics in Dunedin.
Also that month, he won a discus section at the Otago-Southland secondary schools’ athletics.
Meanwhile, Southland Sharks player Josh Aitcheson has been named in the New Zealand team to compete at the under-19 World Cup in Cairo in early July.