Basketball is a rapidly growing sport at Wilson’s, enjoyed by pupils of all year groups. Social games in the playground are popular every break and lunch time, and our school teams are full of enthusiastic and talented players. A good basketball player has strength, speed, agility, and lightning-fast reaction times—and our teams have these skills and more to spare!

It’s been a busy start to the year for most of our Basketball teams as we’ve had a lot of fixtures already this year. The students have all been excited to get playing! The Year Seven team was thrown into the deep end as they played their first game early in the year after only one training session. However, they performed excellently and were triumphant in a 20-17 victory against Whitgift. The team have performed well defensively, and it will be good to see this group develop the attacking side of the game to score even more points. Thank you to all the students that attended the basketball trials this year and well done to the squad selected.

The Year Eight team had a tough start to the year but they’ve made some big improvements. Special mention must go to Arvin and Dexter who have had a big impact both offensively but especially defensively with their effort and determination.

The Year Nines started their Surrey Cup journey well by beating Carshalton Boys 34-33 in a very entertaining and close game. Ali and Yenula were the standout performers on offence, getting to the basket often and scoring at will. Shazaib was tasked with stopping their best player and he did a great job. After a tough opening game against Whitgift, the Year Ten team had an excellent run of results, winning 3 of the next 4 games through October and November. They unfortunately lost in the 2nd round of the Surrey Cup with some key players being unavailable. Special mention to Ali who has been playing a year up and has not looked out of place, alongside Nana who has been dominant on defence.

The Year Elevens started the year with an unfortunate loss to John Fisher in the Surrey Cup but were back to winning ways in their next match with a huge 78-26 victory against Wallington County. Jonathan and Namish did most of the heavy lifting offensively, scoring 27 points and 26 points respectively. The U18 team have had a mixed start to their farewell tour, winning 2 games and losing 2 games. Both losses have been very close and were decided in the final few minutes. The team’s best performance of the season so far was the 66-40 victory against Whitgift. The team's stellar defence was the key to their success.

A special mention must be made of Jude, who has hounded and frustrated opposing guards this year while also scoring regularly as he has done throughout his time at Wilson’s. As Basketball Prefect, he has led the team superbly and has shown excellent commitment to the basketball teams and is always on hand to give advice and assist in coaching younger age groups.

I’m very pleased with the start that we’ve made this year and very proud of the students for their commitment and enthusiasm. It’s clear that basketball is growing in popularity at Wilson’s, and I hope that the teams continue to improve and perform well to help sustain the growth.

Mr Olowu