Terry Doherty

Terry Doherty’s more than 50-years contributions to Queensland basketball have included refereeing, the education of referees and referee coaches and the development of referee and referee coach education curricula.

Terry commenced refereeing basketball in 1967 in Bundaberg. He refereed the first of many Queensland championships in 1969 and the first of six Australian championships in 1970 when he was awarded his Australian Badge. He continued refereeing for 29 years until 1995.  

Throughout the 1970s, 1980s and early 1990s Terry participated as commissioner or referee coach at dozens of Queensland championships and at several Australian championships. He served as state referee coach for four years and following that, as state rules interpreter for nine years until 1989. In 1985 Terry was appointed inaugural Australian Basketball Referees’ Commissioner.

While state referee coach and state rules interpreter, and later into the 1990s and beyond, Terry delivered numerous referee education courses across the state serving the needs of basketball in regional cities and in smaller rural and western places. He was a member of the team that developed Australian basketball’s first accredited Level 1 referee education course.

Terry was a pioneer in the education of basketball referee coaches. The annual live-in seminars he facilitated during the 1980s and early 1990s invariably included components addressing the education of referee coaches. The seminars that he conducted in 1987 were Australia’s first statewide live-in basketball referee coach-specific education events.

During the 1990s Terry commenced the development of a new paradigm of referee education, assessment and reporting. The model was adopted by Queensland’s senior leagues and junior competitions and, for several years during the 2010s, by Australia’s national basketball leagues. Elements of Terry’s referee education literature have been tabled at the International Basketball Federation.

Terry was the first Queensland official to be certified by Oceania Basketball as a referee educator and during the 1980s he developed and delivered education programs in Fiji, the Northern Marianas, Guam, Tahiti and Palau.  

His international participation included preparing officials for the 1989 Oceania Championships in Tahiti and being technical director of the 1989 Micronesia International Tournament in Palau. Terry was the first Queensland official to be appointed as technical director of an international basketball tournament.

Until 2018, Terry continued to volunteer as a referee coach at state championships and at local and regional events, preparing referees and referee coaches for Queensland and Australian championships.

For nine years until 2022, Terry was a member, and then chairman, of the Basketball Queensland honours and awards committee. His historical research as a member of the committee spilled over into Queensland basketball minutiae, contributing to the publication of The Playmakers: The History of Basketball Queensland.  

In 2017 FIBA Hall of Fame Member and Basketball Australia Hall of Fame Legend, the late Al Ramsay MBE OAM, described Terry’s contribution to basketball refereeing: There are few, if any, who have given so much to basketball officiating in Australia. Terry Doherty is a most worthy inductee into the Queensland Basketball Hall of Fame  in the Class of 2024.