While a knee injury threatened to ruin his American college dream, Anthony Dell’orso will soon be over to America to shoot hoops.
The Hume City Broncos player had also dreamed of heading to America to play basketball at college and had spoken to a number of colleges the last couple of years.
But for a moment earlier this year, he wasn’t sure it was going to happen after his knee injury.
“I had a few colleges get in contact,” he said. “I was meant to fly over in January and then I got injured and it sort of back tracked all my processes.
“A lot of those places didn’t go the extra step with the offer based on my injury. Once I got back healthy, we sent over some videos and stuff.”
Division 1 college Campbell University liked what they saw and offered Dell’orso a scholarship. He said once he did the visit he knew it was the college for him.
He is the first Australian male to get a basketball scholarship there.
“I’m pretty stoked, I’ve been thinking about it for a long time,” he said.
“I did a visit to Campbell and once I was over there, they sort of gave me the whole experience and I was like yeah, this is the place for me. I’m really excited.”
While things fell into place for Dell’orso with college, it ruled him out of a second straight national championships.
He said while he thought about playing through the injury, two months of rehabbing was the best decision in the end.
Since returning to the court, he has been one of the keys for the Broncos as they aim for a finals spot in the Big V state championship division.
It’s Dell’orso’s second season with the Broncos, having played his juniors with the Bulleen Boomers.
“It has been good,” he said. “I played last year with the state championship men, but it was more of a role player role being first year straight out of under-18s and I wasn’t used to the men’s program.
“I’m now very comfortable and feel like it’s the right place. We’re doing really well and hopefully we’re going to make play offs and hopefully get a championship.”
Dell’orso said he had always been among the best in his age group, but a growth spurt helped take his game to the next level.
The guard will head over to America next month and is hoping it won’t have an impact on any Broncos finals there might be.
He’s hoping it will be the start of achieving his dream.
“The NBA is my main goal.”
