Jess Whitfort calls herself a student of the game.
Growing up, she spent her weekends pacing the side of her local netball courts as a player, picking up the whistle to umpire then trading that in for a coaching handbook.
She played up to a premier league level, but as a teenager Whitfort found her love for coaching, a job that has now taken her from her home in sunny Queensland to the Deep South of Invercargill as the Southern Steel assistant this season.
Whitfort knows coaching is a grind and climbing the ladder never comes easily, but that never deterred her.
‘‘I’m a true pathway coach,’’ Whitfort told the Otago Daily Times.
‘‘I’m not a big-name player so I’m not going to get handed opportunities and I haven’t really necessarily done it for the opportunities.
‘‘I probably only really started thinking of this as a career in the last five or six years.
‘‘For me it’s just been passion. I just love the game and love developing talent.
‘‘I’ve had some great mentors that have seen something in me and encouraged me.’’
Each team and every season offered something different, helping push Whitfort to be a better coach.
‘‘You try to take something away, and be really reflective and keep trying to grow as a person yourself.
‘‘I do love the challenge of it. I find that’s what keeps me interested, that it is a little bit hard and you’re out of your comfort zone — it’s a very rewarding role.’’
Step by step, Whitfort has climbed her way through the Australian pathway.
She coached in the Victoria Netball League for six years and was later head coach of the Victoria Fury, winning the Australian Netball League in 2019.
Victoria is known for its strong pathways — having contributed several elite players and coaches — and Whitfort spent time in the Melbourne Vixens environment under now head coach Di Honey.
Whitfort, 43, and her family later moved to Queensland, where she was fortunate to work with both the Queensland Firebirds — coached by New Zealander Kiri Wills — and Sunshine Coast Lightning.
She was in charge of the Firebirds Futures programme, where she was the head coach of the Super Netball reserves and the Queensland Academy of Sport talent academy from 2023 to 2025.
Having a hand in guiding the next generation of athletes filled Whitfort’s cup, helping them better understand the lengths it takes to reach the elite levels.
‘‘I loved that role.
‘‘That’s just been an opportunity that probably did fuel my desire to keep going a bit further with my coaching and see where it could take me.’’
It led to Whitfort becoming a national selector and pathway coach for Netball Australia, spending time immersed in the Australian Diamonds camps building up to last year’s Constellation Cup under head coach Stacey Marinkovic.
‘‘Those Diamonds train harder than anyone I’ve ever seen,’’ Whitfort said.
‘‘Stacey and the team are very open to bringing in new ideas and they want your input and you feel like you can add value.
‘‘You really see that next step up again and what it takes.’’
High performance jobs are hard to come by in netball, and looking to keep developing, Whitfort turned to another passion — swimming.
A mutual connection put her in touch with Swimming Australia and Whitfort jumped at the chance to work alongside ‘‘one of the most successful teams in the world’’, running their operations as the high performance programme pathway lead, managing the Australian Dolphins, Australian A and Junior Dolphins international and domestic campaigns.
‘‘I threw myself into it. I absolutely loved it. I really used it as a professional development year.’’
As fate would have it, Whitfort was later shoulder-tapped for the Firebirds role, which she had previously missed out on.
‘‘It’s funny, where I just think you’ve got to keep saying yes to opportunities.
‘‘I think you can find growth as a coach, and as a leader, in all different areas and that exposure to Olympics and world championships, and some of the best athletes in the world, I think grew me as a coach as well.
‘‘I really saw what it takes to even get to that level.’’
‘‘So many of the concepts are the same when it comes to how you communicate with athletes and how you make them feel and how to perform when it matters.’’
Life with the Steel has suited Whitfort.
While it has been a big change for her and her family — who are back in Australia — the Steel’s welcoming environment had made the shift easy.
‘‘I absolutely love it.
‘‘It’s an amazing management team, the athletes are fabulous and the supporters are honestly just so great.’’
Having been involved in Super Netball and the Super Netball Reserves leagues back home, Whitfort is well-placed to judge the ANZ Premiership.
She called the New Zealand league a step up from the Reserves league, but it sat below Super Netball.
‘‘SSN just has so many internationals now. It’s an ever-changing beast.
‘‘You’ve got so many different international superstars and usually a pretty similar style of coaching and you’re just starting to see some international coaches creep in as well.’’
Whitfort, who has been supporting coaches throughout the Netball South zone with coaching clinics, found the ANZ Premiership exciting, packed with flair and close games.
The two-point shot was used less in New Zealand, partially because it is only in its second year and because it is further from the post at 3.5m — the same distance as Fast5 — compared with Australia’s two-point zone which is 3m away, she said.
‘‘We’re developing really amazing athletes like Serina [Daunakamakama] and Khanye [Munro-Nonoa].
‘‘They’re only 22, but they are really showing that they can play at this level. They’re just getting all this court time, which is amazing for their growth and development.’’
Whitfort was hopeful the Steel were filled with future Silver Ferns — and fingers crossed some heading to the Commonwealth Games — and loved being able to play a small role in helping athletes reach their potential.
‘‘It’s very rewarding when you see young players, even senior players, and they’re so involved in the decision making and the connections.
‘‘But when you see it all click, when you see them put it together and they’re really stepping up and growing — not just as netballers but people as well.
‘‘I love being part of that journey. You can’t really beat it.’’
Perhaps Whitfort’s greatest accomplishment is away from the court — raising her six children.
She met her husband, Mike, in her 20s and became a fulltime stepmother to James, 30, Ben, 28, and Claudia, 26, and later had three children of her own: Samuel, 20, Jack, 18, and Maegan, 15.
Coaching fitted in around raising her children — ‘‘it’s a sport where women are quite well supported’’ — but now that her youngest was at boarding school, she had more time to dedicate to her coaching career.
Her family have become the Steel’s biggest supporters, blowing up her phone with countless text messages after each game, and some were decked out in Steel gear in a special Mother’s Day video on the franchise’s social media last month.
‘‘Hopefully if we make finals, they can come over and support. That would be nice.’’
