Hoop Matter FAQs

Hoop Matter is an athlete development program for young basketballers, focusing on mindset, health, and life skills. It teaches the skills that sit around the game: knowing your values, handling pressure, looking after your body, working in a team, and thinking about your future.

We teach kids the rules and skills of basketball from day one. Hoop Matter gives them the same foundation for everything else sport can teach them.

Hoop Matter was created by Anika Brown, founder of Athlete Matter. Anika came through the NSW representative pathway to state level and WNBL train-on squads. She coaches junior basketball, is a mum of two sporty kids, and trained and worked as an occupational therapist in Australia and the UK.

Occupational therapy is about helping people be as independent as they can be through activity that is meaningful to them. That idea sits at the centre of Hoop Matter.

While coaching, Anika saw the same gap again and again. Parents want to help their child be the best they can be at sport, including being the best player and person, but sometimes they're not sure how. Coaches and academies wanted to work on mindset but did not have the time at training.

Hoop Matter puts those tools in the athlete's hands, so they can build them at home, at their own pace.

No. Hoop Matter is a program of Athlete Matter Pty Ltd (ABN 26 701 891 698), a private Australian company. Athlete Matter is the parent brand; Hoop Matter is its basketball program.

Hoop Matter is designed for athletes aged 10 to 14. This is the age when kids are moving into high school, sport gets more competitive, and many start to drift away from it.

No. Hoop Matter is for any young basketballer, from a first season of domestic to a rep squad. The skills it builds (knowing yourself, bouncing back, looking after your body, being a good teammate) help at every level, and off the court too.

Yes. The examples are basketball-based, but the five pillars apply to any sport. The planner is designed to hold all of a child's commitments: school, family events, every sport they play, and rest.

Yes. Many coaches want to work on mindset but do not have the training time to do it. Hoop Matter lets players build those skills at home, so coaches can reinforce them at training rather than teach them from scratch. Clubs and academies interested in kits for a squad can contact us at [email protected].

Hoop Matter is built on the Athlete Matter program model. It puts the young person at the centre, because they matter, and builds out through five pillars.

• You Matter: their values, identity and goals
• Mind Matter: bouncing back from setbacks, handling pressure, managing their inner voice
• Health Matter: rest and recovery, warming up, fuelling and hydrating for performance
• Team Matter: communicating, how to be a good teammate, as well as giving and taking feedback
• Future Matter: where sport and these skills could take them, as a player, in a sport career, or somewhere else entirely

Athletes who know what they value and what they are good at have something steady to come back to when a game goes badly or selection does not go their way. Every other pillar builds on that.

Not only. Some kids want to play at the highest level. Others will coach, work in sport, or use what they learned in a completely different field. Future Matter helps them see that every path counts.

It is easy for a young athlete to pour everything into skills and results. The planner helps them check they have a spread of activity across all five pillars, so they are not focused on one at the expense of the others.

The Ultimate Kit is a hybrid kit. The physical tools are posted to your address, and a private login to the video series arrives by email when your kit ships.

• What Matters Values and Strengths Cards (physical card deck): helps your child identify their top 3 values and top 5 strengths
• Matter Moments Planner (physical planning tool): maps the year and each week across school, family, sport and rest
• You Matter Journal (physical journal): goal setting, a guided question each day, plus free space to journal and draw up plays
• Matter Mini Series (online videos, private login by email): short, practical videos linked to the five pillars, presented by subject matter experts
• Hoop Matter water bottle and pen (physical): a water bottle for training and game day, and a pen for the journal and planner

Each video is presented by an expert in that pillar who brings both professional experience, lived experience, and who knows how to talk to 10 to 14 year olds. Meet the experts.

No. The Matter Mini Series gives general guidance only. If you are worried about your child's wellbeing, health or nutrition, please speak with your GP or a qualified professional.

Writing things down, including goals and tools, can create a level of accountability, focus and clarity. It can also become a reference library of tools for the athlete to come back to whenever they need it.

Writing by hand matters too. Evidence shows handwriting activates wider brain connections than typing, which researchers link to learning. Evidence also suggests people who write their goals down achieve more than those who don't.

1. Cards first. Your child sorts the What Matters cards to find their top 3 values and top 5 strengths, and writes them at the front of their journal.
2. Map the year. On the planner, they mark the big events: school terms and exams, family holidays, rest periods, trials and competition dates.
3. Plan each week. On Sunday night (or the start of the week), they plan the week ahead so they know what is coming and can prepare.
4. Journal daily. Each day they answer one guided question. Every two weeks the questions focus on a different pillar.
5. Watch the videos. The Matter Mini Series topics link to the pillar they are working on.

The program is designed for one to two topic videos a week, with a quick physical break, or Matter break, between topic sessions to keep your athlete engaged.

The daily journal question takes a few minutes. The Sunday plan takes a little longer. It is designed to fit around training, school and family life, not add to the pressure.

Whatever suits your family. Some athletes like to journal before school; others prefer to reflect at night.

Your child owns their kit. Your role is to show interest, make time for the Sunday plan, and ask about what they are learning, without marking or correcting it. Evidence suggests children see a support network that is proud of them and who they are, not just their results, as a significant motivating factor.

That is normal, and sometimes life gets busy. Short, regular habits matter more than doing everything perfectly, so just start somewhere. Try the daily journal question on its own and see the difference it makes to their learning.

The Matter Moments Planner and What Matters cards can be reused and picked up at any time, even outside the suggested 10-week program.

It is also a good time to check in. Losing interest can be a sign that something else is going on, so ask your child how things are going. It can be an important conversation starter.

In Australia, club sport participation peaks between ages 9 and 11 and then declines, particularly for girls (Australian Sports Commission, 2016). The steepest drop begins from about age 13, as kids move into high school (Sport Australia, n.d.). Allianz Australia research found 30% of young Australians had asked their parents to stop playing sport by age 15 (Allianz Australia, 2024).

Research points to a few common reasons: not having fun, being bored, feeling they are not good enough, and pressure from parents, coaches and peers (Dittman, n.d.). Other priorities such as school work and socialising also compete for their time. Allianz found anxiety while playing was a reason for 1 in 10 children without a disability and 1 in 4 children with a disability (Allianz Australia, 2024).

Yes. An Australian study found children who left organised sport between ages 8 and 10 had greater social and emotional difficulties than those who kept playing (Dittman, n.d.). Researchers also link dropout to lower physical activity and poorer health later on (BMJ Open Sport & Exercise Medicine, 2020).

Many of those reasons are about how a young athlete thinks and copes, not how well they shoot. Hoop Matter gives them tools for exactly those moments: knowing why they play, handling pressure and self-doubt, and staying connected to their team.

The Ultimate Kit is $199 including GST, plus $20 flat postage anywhere in Australia, so $219 at checkout.

The physical kit arrives in a custom Hoop Matter box, posted to your address. Your private login to the Matter Mini Series arrives by email when your kit ships.

On the Hoop Matter page.

If your child is involved in an academy or club, check with the administrator or club contact about whether it is a Hoop Matter partner. Hoop Matter partners receive a special partner perk and a club discount code.

Email [email protected].