Another week another Aussie dollar

Wassup my people!! I hope everyone's life is rolling along just fine with all smiles and no major problems!

So since my last post we had a bball game Tuesday against the Warriors. They are a team with two imports (americans) and some decent local guys, but they have struggled to win games and that leaves them towards the bottom of the board. But we still had to respect them as they are a scrappy team and fight hard. Let's just say it was an UGLY game haha, but we got the win. The final score was something like 65-57. I finished with 14 points and 14 rebounds. Definitely didn't shoot the ball well at 5-19fg's, 0-5 from 3pt land. Lately my stroke from deep has been a little bit off and i'm trying to zero it in like when I was in Malaysia. Our next match is Tuesday night against the TV Jets. We are currently 7-2 and I believe tied for 2nd place at the moment.

As far as the NT All-Star team goes the coaches ended up being able to keep all 5 of us Import players on the team!! The coaching staff talked to the NBL management about the situation up here with not as many local guys coming out to play so they decided to let us keep more import guys on the squad. So that's exciting and we should be able to compete a lot better with more americans on the team. Our game is going to be Saturday night at 6pm and we'll be playing against the team that finishes in 8th place, so that's still to be determined at the moment. It should be a great opportunity to showcase our skills so that the coaches of the NBL teams can watch us and possibly even want us for the following season, you never know...

This past week both Bobby and I were asked to do some bball sessions at the Darwin Juvenile Detention Center. So we decided we'd give it a go and have some fun with the boys. We went on Tuesday and Thursday for around 2 hours each time. The boys there were anywhere from 14 to 17 years old and were locked up for a number of things from stealing to fighting, etc. Each kid had to wear a certain colored t-shirt based on what "level" they were classified as by the Juvenile Center. Blue being the "better behaved" kids and Orange being the kids that were probably gonna move to the Prison once they hit 18yrs old. At first I'm not gonna lie, I was skeptical as to how well these kids would wanna listen and actually try in some drills, relays and games. BUT to my surprise the kids were AWESOME and probably one of the best groups I've ever done a session with! They not only listened really well, but got into every relay race and shooting competition with so much enthusiasm and even support for each other. I was happy to see them having fun and getting good exercise in at the same time. They were a good group of boys, but just had a tough up-bringing and probably not the best group of friends outside the walls of the Center. It was fun to help out and a nice change of pace for the week. Just another reason to look at my life and be thankful for the family I have and the situation I'm in. Gotta give praise to the big man upstairs aka GOD!

Work has really been going well. I'm getting a steady 4 days a week, which is perfect. I've met some good people, ate some gooooooooood food :) and really enjoyed getting to do something other than hoop 24/7. I'm looking forward to the next few months, it should be fun!

I've been in contact with some coaches over in Perth WA (western Australia) and also down in South Australia in regards to next season, which for them starts in Feb/march and goes until August. It's always exciting once recruiting starts for a new season. There's emails, phone calls and even in-person meetings that happen. It's part of the business that's really exciting to be involved in! There's nothing like knowing that a couple teams "want" YOU to play for them, it's definitely lets you know that all the hard work and grinding has paid off. So over the next few months I'll be updating everyone as to where it'll look like I'm going to end up for the next 6 months of my professional basketball career. As for now I'm loving Darwin and the situation here, it couldn't be any better (at least from what I can control anyway :) ).

I miss everyone tons at home. Soooooooooo much seems to be happening with the family its crazy! I can't wait to be able to see everyone and get caught up. Thanks to all for following me and this crazy journey i'm on. I would love to get updates on what's going on in your life too!! Hit me up on Skype or by email at any time. All the best until my next post! Cheers :)

Until tomorrow...
"Make it Happen"