Ballarat Miners youth league player Amos Brooks has scored the opportunity of a lifetime.
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The 18-year-old departed Australia this week after receiving a two-year athletic scholarship to play basketball in America.
Brooks will take his talents to Rend Lake Junior College where he will play in the National Junior College Athleltic Association division two competition.
But it might be up to four years before Brooks puts on a Miners uniform again if he achieves what he sets out to do.
"It's about getting fitter, getting more lean, improving my athleticism so that hopefully in a couple of years, I can make a leap to a division one program," he said.
Located four hours south of Chicago, the school boasts a rich sporting history, particularly in football.
Having just won a championship with the Miners in the Big V youth league one competition, Brooks said the competition in the US would be an entirely different ball-game.
There are going to be guys who can jump out of the gym, and there will be guys who are ludicrously quick. But I think but it's only going to make me better as a player.
- Amos Brooks
"It's a different game on the other side of the world and the different experiences should help me improve my basketball," he said.
"It's America, I'm definitely expecting to face some top-class athletes.
"There are going to be guys who can jump out of the gym, and there will be guys who are ludicrously quick. But I think it's only going to make me better as a player."
The big-bodied centre was one of a handful Miners youth league players to see minutes in the NBL1 competition this season under head coach Brendan Joyce.
Brooks said the exposure had helped his development, while training against senior Miners players such as Josh Fox and Marqueze Coleman provided a glimpse of the type of athleticism he would likely encounter overseas.
"It's all been about trying to improve my game to get more exposure to the NBL1 competition and make the semi-professional men's basketball league. That is the major goal for me, to take my basketball to a more professional level," he said.
The trip will mark the first extended period out of home for Brooks who was born and raised in Ballarat.
He said family, and the Ballarat Miners club, was what he would miss the most.
"That's the culture of our club at the minute, everyone is in it for everyone else's improvement as well as their own," he said.
