Right: Berwick Lodge Primary School basketball star Tenaya Phillips won gold at the Pacific School Games in Melbourne earlier this month. Picture courtesy of Swinburne Senior Secondary College.BERWICK Lodge Primary School student Tenaya Phillips capped off a year of stellar sporting achievements by winning a gold medal in the girls’ under-12 basketball at the Pacific School Games held in Melbourne earlier this month.
Eleven-year-old Tenaya, who also won the Southern Metropolitan Sports Award, was both the youngest and the smallest member of the Victorian team, which was undefeated throughout the tournament.
But whatever she lacked in size, the grade-five student made up with tenacity, enthusiasm and no shortage of ability.
Berwick Lodge physical education teacher Kylee Ziino, a gold medal-winning competitor at the 1992 Pacific School Games, said Tenaya’s sporting achievements through the year had been outstanding.
“Tenaya has enormous sporting ability.
“In only her first year here at Berwick Lodge she has excelled in a number of sports,” Ms Ziino said.
Tenaya has been playing competition basketball for the past four years with her twin sister, Kiara.
Both girls have recently been selected to play in the Dandenong Rangers’ under-14 Division 1 team.
Asked about her selection in the Pacific School Games, Tenaya said she was a little scared at first.
“All the girls were older and much bigger than me and, for the first time, I was playing without my sister because she was injured before the tryouts,” she said.
“I want to get a scholarship to play college ball in America and my goal is to be the best point guard in Australia and then go to the WNBA and be the best point guard in the WNBA,” she said.
If she could have one thing for Christmas?
“I would like to grow taller.
“But even if I don’t, I know that I can still be the best point guard ever,” Tenaya said.
