O’Leary will combine his Blaze duties with the newly formed coaching director position and is eagerly awaiting the start of their premiership defence.

“It’s more than likely that we’ll have the whole team minus one player returning for next season,” O’Leary said.

“Jess Sommerville will be leaving us for Melbourne to pursue her studies but we should have everyone else involved and we’re confident of having our American players Shakera (Barnes) and Khiani (Clark) playing as well.”

Josh Clyne will reprise his role as assistant coach with the Blaze in what shapes to be an exciting season for basketball across the state.

Plans have been set in motion to restructure the Waratah League division one women’s competition with the intent of reducing travel between games and O’Leary is expecting a more forgiving schedule in 2019.

“There’s been talk about changing the competition layout and to the best of my knowledge, all the clubs have agreed on restructuring ours into three pools.”

“Wagga would be in a pool with Goulburn, Shoalhaven and Queanbeyan and then we would play teams from further afield during a cross-over round in Sydney.

“That model would ensure there’s way less travelling for us to deal with and it would also encourage more local girls to get involved with the Blaze and could help attract more clubs to the competition.”

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