Kelly Exeter has been involved in basketball as a fan of the game since childhood. Her introduction to the Perth Redbacks was via her late husband Anthony who played in the MSBL team in 2001 (under current MSBL Head Coach CJ Jackson) and then again in 2004/2005 (under the most recently outgoing Head Coach Nik Lackovic). All those years ago, Kelly was struck by how playing for the Perth Redbacks meant you were automatically ‘part of the family’ and when son Jaden commenced his WABL journey with the club three years ago, saw nothing had changed in that regard.
At the end of 2019, when the Redbacks put out a call for volunteers, Kelly offered her experience as a communicator, a former elite athlete and as a sports administrator. Before she could blink, she found herself on the Board. Joining the Board has kept her mind busy after losing Anthony early in 2019 and also helps her feel like she is making a positive contribution to a community that has provided a lot of love and support since that loss.
She’s also excited by the direction in which the club is headed. It has a long and proud history in WA basketball and there are many great people currently working their butts off behind the scenes to elevate operations at all levels – development, Domestic, WABL and SBL.
Kelly looks forward to keeping our members informed of all the great things happening – both at the moment and into the future.
Qualifications
Bachelor of Science (Human Movement and Exercise Science) from the University of WA.
Background
After University, Kelly worked in Sports Administration for two years before retraining in graphic design. She then worked full-time for a marketing agency as their a graphic designer for four years.
While holding down those full-time roles in sports admin and graphic design, Kelly was also competing at an elite level in triathlon. The highlights of that career included representing the country of her birth – Trinidad and Tobago – at two Commonwealth Games (2002, 2006) and one World Championships (2000), and winning the Busselton Half Ironman in 2003.
During her 10 years competing in triathlon, Kelly also worked in a volunteer role for Triathlon WA, managing their design, publications and communications (online and print).
Upon retiring from triathlon Kelly started her own graphic and web design business, Swish Design. She also reactivated her love of writing at this time. Over the past ten years she has written five books of her own while ghostwriting and/or editing ten others.
Together, Kelly and husband Anthony built a suite of businesses under the Swish banner: Swish Design, Swish Online, Swish Consulting and Swish Publishing. Swish Design and Swish Consulting were wound up after Anthony’s death and today Kelly focuses her efforts on the writing and editing work she does via Swish Publishing.
Memberships
- Fremantle Football Club
- Perth Wildcats
Wow,
We are so lucky to have Kelly on the Redbacks team and in the Redbacks family.
The first time I met Kelly at the 2020 SBL Teams’ Launch I knew she was going to be good for the Redbacks. Turns out she is amazing. She joins a group of enthusiastic and dynamic volunteers, coaches and players who can only be enthused by her IT skills, bubbly manner and can-do approach. Kelly’s membership is a vote of confidence in the Perth Redbacks organization and she makes us all proud to be members of the Redbacks family.
Stuart Mackay
That’s really lovely. Thank you Stuart x