Steph Reid has thrown herself fully into being part of the Tasmanian community and can't wait to play in Launceston for the first time this Saturday as the Tasmania Jewels look to stay undefeated in their home WNBL matches.
Reid was a significant coup as a signing for the Jewels ahead of their inaugural WNBL season and she has held up her end of the bargain across the first two games even though she did come into the campaign with a disjointed preparation.
The 30-year-old has made her return to the WNBL for the first time since the 2023/24 season with the Townsville Fire to play with the Jewels and so far she's producing 16.0 points, 6.0 assists, 2.0 rebounds and 1.0 steal a game over the first two matches.
That's been a mixed bag from a team point of view with the tremendous home win at MyState Bank Arena first up against the Geelong Venom before a tough second half last Thursday away to the Southside Melbourne Flyers for a first defeat.
The firsts now continue this Saturday afternoon for the Jewels when they head to Launceston to play at the Silverdome for the first time and they just happen to be hosting the undefeated Sydney Flames to add to the occasion.
Reid can't wait to now get to play in front of the Launceston crowd and hopefully experience a similar atmosphere to what was in Hobart for the first game, and come away with a similar result.
"We're really excited to go up to Launnie and play our first game at the Silverdome," Reid said.
"Sydney are going to be a really tough side, obviously they're 4-0 right now, but I think we've taken away a lot of lessons from that game against Southside.
"We're really excited to get back on the court again, it will have been 10 days now between games so we're absolutely itching at the bit to get out there. We just, oh god, can't wait to play again, we're excited."
Two games in and there's been plenty of lessons to learn from their first two times playing in the WNBL, but the reality is that there's a lot of growth to come with Keely Froling, Madina Okot and Taylor Mole currently unavailable.
Froling and Mole are out injured while Okot has the best possible reason to not be playing while she tries to win a WNBA championship with the Atlanta Dream before joining the Jewels.
What Reid likes is the steps the Jewels continue to take to get better day in and day out.
"See, they're long seasons and you want to be the best at the end of the season so we want to keep growing," Reid said.
"We're very locked into direction over the destination that we're at the moment, and I think we're taking really good steps.
"Obviously we've got Madina to come in as well and Keely to come back. We've been fortunate to pick up Mikaela Ruef in the meantime, but there's a lot of growth opportunity for us.
"We're just trying to take steps in the right direction every day and we're going to be ready to play on Saturday."
It's about much more than playing basketball on the court when you were playing for the Jewels on the back of what the JackJumpers have built to be the pride of Tasmania with what they've done representing the state in the NBL.
Winning on the court is nice, but it's all about being a genuine part of the community and the Jewels have been all about that right from the time they were announced as the WNBL's newest team.
It was a big part of the reason why Reid wanted to return because if she came back to the WNBL having played the last two seasons in Hungary, Poland and China was to come somewhere she make a real difference on and off the court.
Part of that is a new schools program presented by Banjo's that is all about teaching young Tasmanians about resilience, diversity, nutrition and exercise.
The free program aligns with the Australian curriculum and will reach around 100 Grade 3 and 4 classrooms this term across Tasmania, with Reid more than happy to play her role.
"They're (the students) obviously loving it and every school that I've been to so far in Tassie, they've just been all over it, and it's fun to go to schools where they know who you are and where you come from," Reid said.
"I would have loved to have some Tassie Jewels players at my school growing up, it's amazing.
"I think it's an incredible opportunity for the kids of Tasmania to see us in the flesh, to get to build relationships with us and then give them more of an idea of why they should come to games and fall in love with the sport that we all love so much, and get the opportunity to play every day."
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