Wheeler steps up with Southland Sharks season on the line
“I’ve been playing since I was nine and I’m 35 now so there’s 26 years of basketball there."
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Southland Sharks original Andrew Wheeler feels at home taking hold of the coaching reins, although he isn’t sure that he’ll pursue the job permanently in the future.
Wheeler has stepped in as the Sharks coach with usual head coach Guy Molloy away at the moment on international duties with the Tall Ferns.
Molloy’s current absence was flagged when he interviewed for the Sharks job and Wheeler was aware he would be stepping up from his assistant coaching duties at this time of the season.
He spent a game at the helm last year when both then-head coach Rob Beveridge and assistant Leyton Haddleton were absent.
Wheeler - who was part of the original Sharks team in 2010 - isn’t fazed by the added responsibilities.
“I’ve been playing since I was nine and I’m 35 now so there’s 26 years of basketball there.
“Since 2010 with the Sharks I’ve played with some pretty high-level coaches, obviously Rich [Dickel] for three years, and then Paul [Henare] for three years, Juddy [Flavel] for four years, Bevo [Rob Beveridge] for two and now Guy, so I’ve been around long enough.”
Wheeler has suited up for the Sharks as a player this year as well, and he thinks that actual provides some advantages when transferring into the coaching.
“I kind of still have that fresh player’s mindset; the players feel for it on the floor. I watch a lot of basketball and study a lot of basketball as well.”
To also help the situation, Molloy’s system has been relatively embedded into the group before he headed off with the Tall Ferns.
Wheeler pointed to a 2013 instance when then Sharks coach Paul Henare was forced to miss a game to attend a family funeral. It forced players to step up and take more responsibility rather than leaving everything thing to the coach.
He felt a similar situation was happening now.
While Wheeler was confident in his ability as a young coach he’s not sure if it would actually work for him and his family on a potential permanent basis in the future.
“It’s like anything, if you were going to commit to something in the high-performance industry, you’d have to dive fully into it.
“I don’t think with running my own business and having a young family, [coaching fulltime] is something I could do right now.
“Basketball is still growing, so it’s an income thing, right, you get the job for four months, what do you do for the rest of the year? It’s just balancing life factors really.”
Wheeler is known throughout the basketball community as a Sharks legend given his longevity as part of the organisation.
But many probably still aren’t just aware of just what he has poured into the team as a player and a leader in the group over the past 13 years.
Wheeler acknowledges he has been on a bare minimum contract over the years, and is comfortable with that.
Although operating in a professional environment as basically, an amateur sportsperson takes a fair bit of willpower.
In the past, he worked as a lawyer and attended Sharks trainings in the evenings.
However, in recent years the Sharks programme has shifted to a workday-type professional environment. They conduct their gym sessions in the morning and on court training sessions in the afternoon.
Wheeler has continued to attend those trainings during the day while also juggling his tasks as Managing Director at David Reid Homes Southland.
“The season is pretty intense,” he admits.
It has meant tending to a lot of his work commitments outside of traditional work hours, while also being a father to a 19-month-old.
Wheeler has been handed the coaching reins on an interim basis at at time when the Sharks 2023 campaign is teetering with three games to play in the regular season.
Wheeler suggests they probably need to win all three to push into the top six, although two out of three could well get them there depending on other results.
The first of those assignments is tonight [Friday, June 30] against the Franklin Bulls at the ILT Stadium Southland in Invercargill.
Tip-off against the third place Franklin Bulls is set for 7pm.
Wheeler is zero-from-two to date as a head coach and is hoping to get win No 1 at ILT Stadium Southland on Friday.