Pat (Nimmo) Leivesley

Pat (Nimmo) Leivesley's 28-year player career commenced in 1958 when the inaugural Mackay women’s basketball competition was launched, captaining her teamto win the Mackay 1958 summer premiership. In 1959 Vampires changed their name to Vikings and Pat remained captain until moving to Dysart in 1976.

In 1960 Pat led Mackay to win undefeated the Queensland State Championship in Kingaroy at their first attempt and repeated the victory again in 1961 in Toowoomba. She was selected as vice-captain of the Queensland teams playing in the 1960 and 1961 Australian championships played in Melbourne and Newcastle respectively.

In 1962 Pat captained the North Queensland team to an undefeated State Championship title where she received the most outstanding player award and was subsequently selected as Queensland captain for the upcoming Australian Championships in Adelaide; she was the first Mackay player playing in any grade to be named State captain. Pat was unavailable for State selection in 1963 but returned to captain Queensland again in 1964 at the Australian championships at Devonport.

In 1970 a North Queensland women’s team embarked on a goodwill tour of New Zealand, with venues from the north and south islands included in the itinerary. As no-one was available to manage the team, Pat chose to forego the team’s captaincy and acted as the team’s manager as well as playing. Pat was an outstanding team manager interacting with media, players, and officials at all of the venues.

Pat Nimmo was awarded life membership of Mackay Basketball in 1976 and after moving to Dysart later that year she soon became captain/coach of the Dysart Vikings, as well as captain/coach of the Dysart team which competed successfully in Central Highlands carnivals.

During all of her years playing basketball Pat also served on the associations’ management committees and taking up the role of association publicity officer. Pat also coached many lower grade and junior teams, showing players the pathway towards success in basketball and in life.

Pat and her family returned to Mackay in 1986 and again served another two years on the management committee and in 1994 was a member of the Mackay QBL management team with the responsibility publicity of the Meteors and Meteorettes.

Pat (Nimmo) Leivesley is a very worthy member of the Class of 2021 of the Queensland Basketball Hall of Fame.