Set for great heights

UP IN LIGHTS: Kara Adrole has been named in the NZ Under 14 Girls Koru basketball team. PHOTO/STUART MUNRO

SHE has been a success at many sports, but it is basketball which has offered towering Wanganui Intermediate pupil Kara Adrole her first black uniform.

The 12-year-old, who stands 1.75 metres (5ft 9 inches) and is likely to top out at 2.06 metres (6ft 9) by the time she stops growing, has been chosen for the NZ Koru Under 14 Girls squad who will compete at the Australian Country Junior Basketball Cup at Albury, Victoria, in January.

The Koru squads, which are development youth teams, travel annually to Australia to compete against the local state sides.

Adrole, who has represented Wanganui in age grade swimming, touch rugby, tennis, badminton, netball and basketball, had been so busy with other code practices that she didn't know about her national selection.

The first she heard was at touch rugby on Sunday when she was congratulated by people who read the 12-person team list online. Adrole, one of five sporting siblings and the daughter for former Wanganui rugby representative Nemia Adrole, said she could not wait to experience going on the tour and wearing the national colours.

"Playing with different players from all around New Zealand."

Adrole plays for Wanganui Intermediate in the Tuesday night school competition.

She earned the selectors' attention playing in a composite team at the regional competitions, held in Hastings earlier this year, where her mother had to buy her American size 12 shoes because her other footwear was too small to play in. She has been chosen for the Koru team at centre forward, which is a relief because in Hastings she often had to cover point guard " a distribution role best suited to smaller players.

While Adrole's main passion has been netball, the time will be coming where the young allrounder will likely have to think about focusing on a particular code. "I kind of think it will be basketball," she said.

The New Zealanders depart on January 7 for ten days in Australia, with their first games on January 10.