By APHIWE NGOWAPI
Makhanda basketball coach Xolisa Kula, also known as Coach X, represented the Eastern Cape in the final selection of the Basketball Senior National Teams Coach.
Basketball South Africa invited its members and qualified coaches to apply for coaching positions in both the men’s and women’s senior national teams. “The Federations are the only ones who can approach individuals they think would be an asset to the post,” said Kula, who applied through the Eastern Cape Basketball Federation Association.
“There are high-performance coaches in every province, so if anything like that were to come out, they would know exactly who to approach,” he added.
In the Eastern Cape, Kula is the only coach that made it into the Basketball SA’s selection. He said that he is humbled to be amongst the other great basketball names. Kula explained that the selection process requires the individual to have coaching qualifications, coaching experience, and won tournaments. In addition, the coach needs to have made a great impression on the teams they have coached and maintained good coaching experience for some time.
Although Kula did not get the assistant coach position he applied for, he maintains that he lost out to a good candidate who had applied for the head coach position. Coach X said he is proud to have made it thus far and represented the Eastern Cape in the national selection finals.
Kula is an administrator at Rhodes University and coaches basketball at St. Andrew’s College in Makhanda. As a coach, he describes himself as disciplined. “I believe in punctuality, and I believe in professionalism. How you carry yourself should also reflect how you play in that particular team,” he said.
Coach X also added that basketball is like a “vehicle” for someone to improve their quality of life because most sporting professionals tend to do well in life. That is because they practice discipline and have specific routines or practices.
See Kula’s name in Basketball SA’s coach finalists list
