Irish U-18 national basketball team visits Newton

While the NBA season concluded a month ago in disappointment for the Boston Celtics, a different band of 20 ballplaying Celtics took to the Newton North gymnasium for a clinic to refine their skills Sunday afternoon.

As part of their inaugural two-week tour of America, the Irish Under-18 national basketball team participated in a three-hour clinic under the watchful eyes of Newton North basketball coach Paul Connolly and Newton South coach Joe Killilea.

The group of Ireland's finest young ballplayers will spend the next two weeks venturing from Cape Cod to Maine, while being housed in Allston and Brighton by volunteer host families. The team will compete in 13 exhibitions against local teams, attend six clinics led by area coaches, and partake in six practices at Suffolk University.

As part of the itinerary, the players will also tour Boston and visit the State House and Boston City Hall to add a cultural flair.

The itinerary for the first-year program was put together by Joe Walsh, the commissioner of the Great Northeast Athletic Conference. Funding was also arranged for and provided by Jack Doyle and the International Association of Approved Basketball Officials Board 27. This is the first year the Under-18 team has traveled to America instead of solely playing games in Europe.

One of their coaches, John Fitzgibbon, saw the tour as a prime opportunity ``to get the kids exposure (from coaches at the next level), and to see how intense they have to practice, as well as the higher level of playing in America.'' The tour's most important goal, in Fitzgibbon's words, was to ``forge a link that could yield, from the 20 participants, six that could be playing on the senior basketball team in five or six years.''

``We'd like them to be exposed to, from a skills and games point of view, the type of professionalism and techniques that American players and coaches hold,'' remarked the Head of Delegation Eddie Guilmartin.

To that end, Connolly began by instructing the players on shooting fundamentals. He then led the group through a three-man weave drill designed to practice the team's shooting and communication. Later, the team broke into split squads and did a 3-on-2 exercise that practiced transition defense and ball movement.

Killilea took over halfway through, and ran drills emphasizing defensive fundamentals and correct defensive posture.

Connolly commended the Irish players on their openness to criticism during the drills. Connolly described the squad as a ``real, real hardworking group with terrific leadership.''

Connolly jumped at the opportunity to work with the players. Connolly's wife works in Education First, which is a company that provides educational tours. The similarity in programs was something that excited Connolly.

``I see it as a great opportunity for them to develop culturally, athletically, socially and emotionally,'' Connolly said. ``Basketball is now the world's game and it's great to see how our game is popular on so many levels.''

The Irish Under-18 baskeball team was formed from an open tryout of 80 players that were narrowed down to the 20 that traveled to America. Fitzgibbon noted that the players came from all over Ireland.

``We have a smaller pool to choose from, as basketball is often the fifth choice of sport behind the two Irish sports, hurling and Gaelic football, as well as rugby and soccer,'' Fitzgibbon said.

Still, the players were great fans of the game, as Guilmartin noted.

``They follow the career of Pat Burke, and the professional and college ranks,'' Guilmartin said.

Burke is a former NBA player, though never a Boston Celtic, who plays for the senior Irish National Team.

With the inspired performance of the team and the game's continue growth overseas, the prospects of a true Celtic one day playing for the NBA's Celtics are improving day by day.