TOWERING AMBITIONS

Malmi Hettiarachchi is torn between love for her sport and country and goes down under – Allaam Ousman has more

Even as a young girl, Malmi Hettiarachchi had towering ambitions – not only to represent Sri Lanka in basketball and netball but play in the Women’s National Basketball Association (WNBA), the US’ professional league.

And she has also not given up on her dream of becoming the first Sri Lankan woman to ‘slam dunk’ in the sport.

Blessed with talent and encouraged by her parents – both former Sri Lankan basketball players – Hettiarachchi has not only emulated them but done one better by becoming a double international in basketball and netball.

Handpicked by Sri Lanka’s netball legend Hyacinth Wijesinghe to make her international debut at the Asian Netball Championships in Singapore in 2022, she achieved her target of winning a gold and went on to represent the country in the Netball World Cup in South Africa last year.

It was on the basketball court that she first made an impact after tagging along with her mother Manori, who was an assistant coach at Sirimavo Bandaranaike Vidyalaya. A fine athlete and swimmer, she was drawn to basketball and subsequently, netball.

Standing above average height at 170 centimetres, Hettiarachchi was the captain of her school teams in both sports. She emerged as the star performer on her international debut in basketball, ranking third at the FIBA Asia Cup in India (2017) – she displayed her shooting prowess and lived up to her promise of bagging multiple awards as ‘Best Offensive Player.’

More significantly, she blossomed to become ‘Netball Queen’ at the 2021 National Netball Championships, representing Hatton National Bank (HNB) – which she joined as a trainee banking associate – and in the mercantile tournament the following year, underlining her status as the most valuable player in the country.

Her dream run in Sri Lanka may be on pause as the 22-year-old moves to Australia to pursue higher studies but her fairytale story may only be beginning down under.

“I’d love to improve my technique and give something back to my country in both basketball and netball,” says Hettiarachchi, who will be studying sports psychology at a university in Melbourne.

She adds: “I will be available to play for the national team if called but I’d also love to contribute from the sports psychology side.”

However, she still fancies her chances of dunking in basketball, aiming to emulate her father Daminda: “It’s because my father used to dunk. In Sri Lanka, women can’t dunk but I became famous for rebounding because of the jump. It helps in netball as well.”

Basketball is her first love but having excelled in netball, it has become difficult to play both for the country. Despite being at the top in both sports, Hettiarachchi laments that she had to make a choice when playing at the international level.

Nonetheless, her basketball skills complemented her netball efforts where she played wing or goal defence: “Playing basketball helped because netball has become a contact sport.”

Relating her experience and the difference in levels at the Asian Netball Championships and Netball World Cup, she explains: “Height is a factor but if we have skill, we can overcome that disadvantage. We must learn new techniques and do more strength training.”

She adds: “We have to be faster and more athletic.”

Hettiarachchi treasures achieving the rank of third in Asia in basketball and being Asian champion in netball: “I wanted to win a gold medal with my netball debut because we were champions last time.”

The World Cup was a different experience against physically strong players. “There is a huge difference between the Asian Netball Championships and World Cup. We have to improve a lot technically and physically to match them,” she asserts.

Among her sporting idols are NBA legend Kobe Bryant (basketball) and Jamaican netball star Shamera Sterling, whom she had the good fortune to play against during the World Cup.

Commenting on her journey thus far, Hettiarachchi says: “I’ve faced many challenges throughout this journey. My family has supported me and because of them, it was easy to achieve. My father (a former national selector) coached me before trials. And it was hard balancing studies and sports – I achieved good results because my mother pushed me while my dad looked after the sports side.”

She tries to remain motivated to continue her career in sports while her story serves as an inspiration to young girls in the country to pursue their dreams.

Her message to young girls is that “pursuing sports will help you multitask, and ba­lance your career and life as well.”