Tara Murray
Wyndham basketball young gun Dyani Ananiev is taking in everything she can as a development player for the Bendigo Spirit.
Having been a development player for the Women’s National Basketball League last season, Ananiev is back involved with the squad again under new coach Kennedy Kereama.
Ananiev said she was excited to be part of the Spirit program again. She said she was getting to train with players she had only ever dreamed of meeting.
“It’s pretty exciting,” she said. ”Last year with Tracey [York] was fun, this year we’ve got Kennedy [Kereama].
“The experience of all the girls has been really good. I’ve been learning a lot of different skills and taking in everything.
“One of the biggest things last year was talking with the players that have gone through college and made me more excited about that.”
Ananiev said last year she joined the program after York reached out and she tried out a few times.
This year she said it was the connection between Wyndham coach Gerard Hillier and Kereama that had set things in motion.
It was Hillier that was behind her decision to join Wyndham this year, where she played a major role for the club in its Big V women’s state championship title.
“G is an awesome coach and I always wanted to play for him,” she said. “I was able to do that this year and learned so much getting on the court.
“He’s an awesome development coach and it was a really good season. G wasn’t able to coach the final series, so we all wanted to win it for him.”
Ananiev said it took her a while to find her feet at Wyndham and getting the opportunity to take on such a big role.
She finished the season averaging nearly 20 points a game, the second most in the division. She was also named the Big V championship women’s youth player of the year and was named in the all-star five team for the championship division, while was nominated by the most valuable player award.
“I didn’t expect that starting off the season,” he said. “I was a bit shaky and nervous and not playing how I wanted to.
“G told me to just play my game and I started to get some confidence,” she said. ”AP [Amanda Paschal] was unreal and taught me a lot of things and I started to play the way I wanted to.”
While currently training for the upcoming WNBL season, things are already starting to fall into place for Ananiev for next year.
She’s verbally committed to going to college in Portland and is expecting to head over there in the middle of next year.
She’s also keen to return to Wyndham and play a second season with the club.
Long term Ananiev is happy to see where her basketball takes her.
“I’ve never been the kind of player to plan out what I want to do,” she said.
“I would like to play for Australia, but I’m taking it step by step and seeing where it takes us.”
