WHEN Hannah-Lee Williams' mother came into her room dancing this week she wasn't really sure what was going on before she too joined the celebrations.
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It is because she learned she had been selected in the Netball NSW First Nations emerging talent team.
The Bathurst 16-year-old was one of 12 players who got the nod.
"Mum and that got the email and they came into my room dancing. I had no clue what was going on," she said of the moment she learned of her selection.
"When they told me I was really excited, I think they were more excited than I was, but I was pretty happy to find out."
While this marks the first time that Williams has been given the tick of approval by Netball NSW officials, she is no stranger to the representative level.
After her mother encouraged her to take up the sport, she has been playing representative netball for Bathurst since under 11s and is also a member of the Western Region Academy of Sport squad.
On a club level she plays for Mana Toa in the Bathurst Netball Association's colts competition and backs up in A grade too.
As for what position Williams plays, she laughs and explains it depends on what team colours she wears.
"My club team, for my Mana colts team I play shooter and A grade I play shooter, but then for WRAS I play mid-court, then in reps my coach sometime puts me at shooter, but I mainly play wing attack and mid-court," she said.
"I prefer to play shooter, but I'm a bit short."
It was playing for WRAS that Williams first caught the attention of Netball NSW selectors, then she had to attend a selection trial.
"We just did a bit of skills work and then play a lot of games, there were quite a lot of kids to trial actually, the regional and First Nations squads trialled together," she said.
As Williams indicated, the First Nations squad was picked from the trials along with a Metro and Regional emerging talent squad. Fellow Bathurst talent Mia Baggett was selected in the latter.
All three squads will train over the next three months and finish with the Emerging Talent Tournament in September.
As a proud Wiradjuri women, Williams is eager to provide an inspiration to the other Indigenous netballers in Bathurst.
Her selection in the First Nations squad adds to her previous experience representing the NSW Echidnas at the Australian Indigenous Schoolgirls Netball Tournament.
"The last time I played at that I was 14 and I played up in under 18s because they didn't have enough players," she said.
"I played centre court then and shooter a couple of times.
"I'm very happy to be the in [First Nations] side, I feel like I can have a positive influence."
Williams is hopeful of playing with the Echidnas again next year while her Bathurst representative season has ended after helping the under 17s be crowned undefeated division two state champions.
"The Bathurst rep stuff is over now because we won at state, we won all 19 games," she said.
"With WRAS we have a couple more training sessions then we have an Academy Challenge at Port Macquarie."
Her club duties will resume on July 23 after the school holidays break concludes.
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