Challenges of an established amateur sport: Exploring how wheelchair basketball grows and thrives through a sport development lense Joshua R. Pate1 Danielle Bragale1 1James Madison University Wheelchair basketball has been played in the United States for more than 70 years, and the National Wheelchair Basketball Association (NWBA) governing body has professionalized the sport to some extent with a league and culminating annual championship for its eight divisions. However, teams continue to face challenges that characteristically align with those of amateur sport in addressing recruiting and retaining athletes. The purpose of this study was to examine how the amateur sport of wheelchair basketball grows and thrives in recruiting and retaining participants. Green’s (2005) theory of sport development was chosen as the lens for this study because of its focus on establishment of a sport for sustainability through athlete participation. An online open-ended questionnaire was sent to all 139 NWBA team contacts, with 28 responses representing multiple divisions within the league. Findings revealed that funding is the biggest challenge as teams offered little support for tournament travel or financial rewards for athletes. Teams recruited athletes through social connections and community presence, but offered little structure for their means of retaining athletes. These findings show the NWBA teams operate with challenges akin to amateur sport due to uncertainty of funding and athlete sustainability. Introduction II veterans completing rehabilitation in heelchair basketball began California and Massachusetts (NWBA, in 1946 as a physical activity n.d.a). Recreational contests were Woption for injured World War held between veterans and doctors at Journal of Amateur Sport Volume Five, Issue One Pate and Bragale, 2019 50 Table 1 competition and athletic demands due to a number of rules similarities to NWBA divisions ambulatory basketball. It is also a popular Division Number of programming element for inclusive Teams sport organizations that offer sport Division I 27 and recreation for people with physical Division II 33 disabilities although equipment can cost Division III 53 as much as $2,000 per sport wheelchair. Intercollegiate 16 While the sport has grown since its Women’s Division 10 inception in 1946 in the United States Total 139 and the NWBA has established structure for the sport in some ways, an aging rehabilitation facilities until a team from demographic in specific communities Birmingham, CA, traveled to the Corona with small populations and geographic Naval Station almost 30 miles away for what is recognized as the first contest between two wheelchair basketball teams Table 2 (NWBA, n.d.a). The sport grew within Veterans Administration hospitals, and in States/territory represented in the current study 1948 the National Wheelchair Basketball State/Territory Number of Teams Association (NWBA) was organized Alabama 1 under the direction of Tim Nugent at the Arizona 2 University of Illinois (Strohkendl, 1996). California 2 The NWBA serves as the governing Connecticut 1 body of competitive wheelchair Florida 2 basketball in the United States, with eight Illinois 4 divisions: Junior Division-Prep, Junior Kentucky 1 Division-Varsity, Division I, Division Maryland 1 II, Division III, Intercollegiate Men’s, Minnesota 1 Intercollegiate Women’s, and Women’s. As Missouri 3 of 2018 there were 139 teams competing Nevada 1 in the NWBA. Globally, wheelchair Texas 1 basketball continues to grow among Utah 1 people with disabilities and is played by Virginia 1 more than 100,000 people in more than Washington 2 80 countries (Hutzler, Barda, Mintz, & Wisconsin 1 Hayosh, 2016). * Puerto Rico 1 The sport is an attractive option for * Washington D.C. 2 athletes with physical disabilities seeking * Denotes U.S. territory Journal of Amateur Sport Volume Five, Issue One Pate and Bragale, 2019 51 limitations presents challenges for the with disabilities: (a) unemployment or longevity of the sport’s development underemployment; (b) inability to walk (Hutzler et al., 2016). College campuses outdoors due to terrain and safety; (c) around the United States have slowly inability to walk long periods of time adopted wheelchair basketball at the for health benefits; (d) transportation recreational, intramural, club sport, to community fitness facilities; and (e) and varsity sport levels. The University lack of fitness facilities with accessible of Illinois’s varsity program was the equipment, classes, programs, or trained first to offer wheelchair basketball as a staff to adapt programs and services. competitive option for students. These barriers are a mix of both In all, 16 teams at 11 universities structural and psychological barriers. offered varsity wheelchair basketball Previously, however, Rimmer, Riley, competing in the NWBA Intercollegiate Wang, Rauworth, & Jurkowski (2004) division as of 2018. The NWBA, identified 10 categories of barriers however, is far broader than a college related to access to and participation campus and includes teams that have in physical activity that were primarily no support system from a university or structural barriers: (a) build and natural rehabilitation center. Still, the challenges environment; (b) cost/economic; that NWBA teams face as well as (c) equipment; (d) guidelines, codes, approaches to recruiting and retaining regulations, and laws; (e) information; (f) athletes to play competitive wheelchair policies and procedures; and (g) resource basketball have not been explored. It is availability. Additionally, Rimmer et al. important to identify and examine these identified psychological barriers such as challenges teams face to give the league emotional/psychological; knowledge, and teams a better grasp on establishing education, and training; and perceptions a pipeline for future athletes and keeping and attitudes. Comprehensively, these existing athletes. Thus, the purpose categories provide a framework for of this study was to examine how the common barriers in disability sport and amateur sport of wheelchair basketball specifically wheelchair basketball. grows and thrives in recruiting and Structural barriers are mostly related retaining participants.. to physical space such as access to a facility, equipment access or existence, Literature Review and funding for disability sport Disability Sport Barriers opportunities (Wilson & Khoo, 2013). Disability sport faces a myriad of One commonly identified barrier for challenges and barriers within the athletes with disabilities is accessing general public sports sphere. Rimmer transportation to a facility for those (2015) identified five categories of needing to travel long distances for barriers to physical activity for people either training or competition (Kean, Journal of Amateur Sport Volume Five, Issue One Pate and Bragale, 2019 52 Gray, Verdonck, Burkett, & Oprescu, sport participation due to expenses of 2017). Transportation has been noted transportation and equipment. Even as a major factor that influences within the NWBA, athletes may be participation of athletes with disabilities responsible for their own transportation (Cottingham, Carroll, Lee, Shapiro, & and equipment expenses (e.g., sport Pitts, 2016; Darcy, Lock, & Taylor, 2016). chair). A way to offset funding gaps is Cottingham et al. (2016) also found that sponsorship, but Kean et al. (2017) found assistive transportation devices such that American athletes have difficulty as the wheelchair can limit an athlete’s securing wheelchair sponsorship even at access to exercising. the highest level of competition. Equipment access is another Other structural barriers have common structural barrier for athletes been found to prevent or stymie with disabilities (Rimmer et al., 2004). A disability sport participation, including lack of proper adaptive sports equipment organization and structure of disability for athletes prevents full inclusion of sport (Thomas & Guett, 2014), access participants (Burkett, 2010). More to sport websites (Cottingham et specifically, standard assistive devices al., 2016) and even an increasingly may not appropriately accommodate all aging population of participants (e.g., athletes due to the variance of disability limitations due to age; Ng, 2007). (Burkett, 2010). Athletes with high Thomas and Guett (2014) found support needs (e.g., power and manual that disability sport organization and wheelchair users) have identified that structures are problematic across Europe access to proper equipment is a barrier because they operate in silos divided by to their athletic performance (Darcy et issue rather than moving forward as one al., 2016). While access to equipment united movement. Still, legislation in is limiting, it is the cost of adaptive the United States such as the Americans equipment that prevents access as with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) has athletes with disabilities often do not implemented legal measures to ensure have the financial resources for high- equal opportunities for people with performance adapted equipment equal to disabilities, including opportunities to their high-performing expectations and participate in sport. Globally, Article 30 achievements (Kean et al., 2017). of the United Nations’ Convention on Thus, funding has emerged as a the Rights of Persons with Disabilities third common category of structural states that people with disabilities have barriers for disability sport (Rimmer et the right to participate in recreation, al., 2004).