Canterbury Rams

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Canterbury Rams

Established	1982
Team Colours	Red
Home Venue	Cowles Stadium, Christchurch
Major Sponsor	Marley
Championships	(4) 1986,1989,1990,1992
Team History	Canterbury Rams (1982-Present)
Owner	Peter Dwan
Coach	Bert Knops
Captain	Jeremy Kench
Website	www.rams.org.nz

The Canterbury Rams (also known as MARLEY Canterbury Rams, for sponsorship reasons), are a National Basketball League (NBL) team from Christchurch, New Zealand. They first started playing in the National League back in 1982.

The Rams will play their home matches at Cowles Stadium in Aranui from 2008, onwards. They previously played at he state of the art 8,500 seater Westpac Arena in Addington, Christchurch, New Zealand, from 1999-2007,which they shared with netball's Canterbury Flames. In their first ever match at Westpac Centre in March 1999 the Rams lost narrowly to the Wellington Saints. Occasionally the Rams will take one of their regular season home games to another part of the franchise area such as Timaru or Blenheim.

The Rams' current home uniform is predominantly red, while their alternate strip is white. Canterbury mascot "Rambo", is said to be the best mascot in the New Zealand Basketball League, if not the whole of New Zealand sport.

1 History
2 Current roster

[edit] History

[edit] "Glory Days " (1986-94)

Canterbury was one of the most dominant teams in the New Zealand NBL's early days. From 1986-1994 the rams played in seven grand finals winning four of these . This successful nine year tenure was thanks to stand-out American players like Clyde Huntley and Eddie Anderson, Angelo Hill who were two of the league's best ever early import players. Other players to play a key role during this era were local players such as John "Dutchie" Rademakers, Gilbert Gordon, Terry Brunel, Ian Webb, Glen Denham, Chris Tupu, Graham Timms, John Hill, youngster Ralph Lattimore and another star American import player Kenny Perkins (Paternal Father of Kendrick Perkins (Boston Celtics)who later played for the Nelson Giants. The architects of this success were coaches Gary Pettis who led the team from 1986-88 and Keith Mair who took over in 1989.

[edit] Mid 1990s

The success of the rams in the late 1980's, early 90's fell away in the mid 1990s. The rams failed to make the NBL playoffs from 1995-1997. This playoff drought was however broken in the 1998 season, but Canterbury did not progress far being eliminated at the semi final stage by the Nelson Giants.

[edit] Westpac Arena era (1999-2007)

At the start of the 1999 New Zealand NBL season, the rams moved into the huge new Westpac Centre, now named Westpac Arena. in Addington, Christchurch. There was a great deal of anticipation before the season in Christchurch that the rams could finally win some silverware after not having won a title since 1992. This was combined with an exciting roster consisting of American Clifton Bush, Canadien Robert Wilson, and an up and coming team of kiwis like David Langrell, Jason Kyle and Craig Farrant. The rams started the 1999 season slowly, but made the playoffs ending up with a 10-6 record in second place. The rams won the right to host the playoff series at Westpac Centre and after defeating the North Harbour Kings in the semi final, they progressed onto the grand final against Auckland. It was not to be Canterbury's year however, with the rams going down in a close fought final to Auckland.

There was a massive cleanout at the Canterbury Rams under new management after the 1999 season. Head coach Bert Knops was replaced by Matt Ruscoe for the 2000 season and most the cast from 1999 were not retained. The rams fielded an extremely young roster and this showed in their play, finishing second last with only two wins against North Harbour and Otago. After a year rebuilding in 2001, a season that saw the team improve drastically, including a 50 point home victory over the Saints. Unfortunately derision from then owner John Watson into coach and player matters undermined the impact of Ruscoe's tenure ending with Watson self appointing himself after the successfull in season recruitment of league legend Terrence Lewis. Canterbury had an excellent year in 2002 under first year head coach John Watson. With a new star signing in Terrence Lewis from Wellington and American centre John Whorton, Canterbury had two of the best import players in the league. Whorton and Lewis were the league leaders in scoring all year long, carrying Canterbury to an 11-5 regular season record, good enough for third place. In the semi final Canterbury travelled to Hamilton to take on the Waikato Titans . After three quarters the Rams were playing good basketball and lead by 12 points and they appeared headed for the grand final in Watson's first year as coach . Things turned ugly in the final quarter though and Waikato came from behind to beat the rams, and eventually win the NBL grand final, a week later. Ominously Lewis did not return sighting coaching as a major reason.

In 2003 and 2004 the rams failed to make the playoffs under the coaching of John Watson and then Pete McAllister. After a dismal 2003 season when the rams finished second last after their outstanding 2002 season, John Whorton - arguably one of the league's best American players of the decade was not retained. On June 14, 2003 John Whorton had scored a league-record 50 points in a 99-94 Rams victory over the Hawkes Bay Hawks in Napier.

During the 2004 off-season word cirulated around that the rams were in line to sign former NBA bad-boy Dennis Rodman for the 2005 NBL season . This would have been a major coup for the rams, as attendances would have sky-rocketed. In the end though, the rumours amounted to nothing, with Rodman's price tag, being far too expensive far the rams to afford. [1]

In 2005 under Pete McAllister the rams began the season brilliantly starting the season 5-1 thanks to the strong play of new imports Mike Gardener and Ryan Prillman. Canterbury started to struggle though as the season progressed and although the team finished with a highly satisfactory 10-8 record, they narrowly missed out on the final playoff spot finishing in fifth position. After the 2005 NBL season Pete McAllister got a job at New Zealand basketball and he was subsequently forced to resign as the Rams head coach. In January 2006, American Chris Sparks was named head coach to fill McAllister's void.

Canterbury fielded a very youthful roster in 2006, with half of the squad under the age of 22. The rams once again failed to make the playoffs finishing with a 6-12 final record. American import Dennis Trammell was a stand-out for the Rams averaging 25 points a game. Jeremy Kench had a break out year for Canterbury with 18 points a game, significantly up on his 2 point average from the previous year. He was also named to the Tall Blacks National team roster. The outlook looks positive for the future, despite the side's disappointing winning record.

The Rams had a disappointing 2007 NBL season finishing 4-14. Point guard Jeremy Kench followed up his breakout 2006 year with another strong season. One of the rare highlights was the improvement of young centre Mike Townsend.

[edit] The shake-up (2008-)

In late 2007 the Canterbury Rams announced huge changes. Head coach, Chris Sparks, who coached the Rams in 2006 and 2007 resigned, and returned to America. Bert Knops who coached the Rams from 1996 to 1999 was reappointed. Owners John Watson and George Kazan ascended (The Canterbury Basketball Association has a management contract for the Rams that they pay for, despite the ongoing presence on committees and boards of owner John Watson) the ownership back to Canterbury basketball in another major move. Canterbury basketball also announced in late 2007 that they will return to their former home arena of Cowles Stadium as of the start of 2008, after nine years at the Westpac Arena. Unfortunately at the beginning of the 2008 season the Rams announced a shortfall of over 250,000 leaving there ongoing participation in the league tedious until new sponsor Marley and NZCT moved in to bail the team out. The Rams again struggled on the court, again missing the playoffs with a 6-12 record.

[edit] Current roster

Current roster as of 1st March,2007

Canterbury Rams Current roster
Head Coach: Bert Knops			Edit
G	25	Gerard Bowden	(Palmerston North, NZ)
F/C	22	Joey Harrell *	(Durham, NC, UNC Asheville)
G	8	Jeremy Kench	(Wellington, NZ)
G	4	Dave Langrell	(Wellington, NZ)
F/C	32	Rewi Manahi	(Christchurch, NZ)
G	11	Paul McFarlin	(Christchurch, NZ)
F/C	22	Willy McVitty	(Palmerston North, NZ)
F	10	Mark Morrison	(Invercargill, NZ)
F	24	Luke Ruscoe	(Christchurch, NZ)
C	14	Mike Townsend	(Christchurch, NZ)
F/C	32	Ben Van Oosten	(Christchurch, NZ)
C	52	John Whorton *	(Columbus, OH, Kent State University)
*=Import, #=Developmental player			Canterbury Rams

[edit] Past Head Coaches

Bert Knops 1996-1999
Matt Ruscoe 2000-2001
John Watson 2002-2004
Peter McAllister 2004-2005
Chris Sparks 2006-2007
Bert Knops 2008-

[edit] Past import players

1998: Clifton Bush , Raymond Harding

1999: Clifton Bush , Robert Wilson

2000: Alex Lopez , Malcolm Leak . Leak replaced half season by John Watson

2001: John Whorton

2002: John Whorton

2003: John Whorton , temporarily filled by Mike Pegues

2004: Kenny Walker , Damian Matacz

2005: Mike Gardener , Ryan Prillman

2006: Dennis Trammell , Sam Spann

2007: Mychal Green , Michael Joiner

2008: Joey Harrell Wilder Auguste . Auguste replaced half-season by John Whorton

[edit] Honour roll

NBL Championships:	4 (1986,1989,1990,1992)
NBL Playoff Appearances:	13 ( 1982,1984,1985,1986,1987,1989,1990,1992,1993,1994,1998,1999,2002 )
NBL Grand Final appearances:	8 (1986,1987,1989,1990,1992,1993,1994,1999)
NBL Most Valuable Player:	John Whorton(2002)
MVP Non-Restricted Player:	John Rademakers(1984), Terrence Lewis (2002)
All-NBL First Team:	Clyde Huntley(1983), Clyde Huntley(1984), Clyde Huntley(1986), Clyde Huntley (1987), Eddie Anderson(1991), Terrence Lewis(2002), John Whorton(2002), Ryan Prillman (2005)
Most Outstanding Guard:	Clyde Huntley (1986), Eddie Anderson(1991), Terrence Lewis(2002)
Most Outstanding Forward/Centre:	John Whorton (2002)
Most Outstanding Non-Restricted Guard:	John Rademakers (1986), Chris Tupu (1994), Terrence Lewis (2002)
Most Outstanding Non-Restricted Forward/Centre:	Glen Denham (1990)
Leading Individual NBL scorer:	John Whorton (2002), John Whorton (2003),Dennis Trammell(2006)
Leading Individual NBL Rebounder:	John Whorton(2002), John Whorton(2003)
Leading Assists :	Clyde Huntley (1984), Scott Stewart(1996), Carlo Varicchio(2002)
Coach of the Year:	John Watson (2002)
Non-Restricted Rookie of the Year	Arthur Trousdell (2000)