Definition of "Opals"

Carrie Graf knows about coaching creative individual players, as she has coached women′s basketball superstar Lauren Jackson, who shot to fame as a 15-year-old and joined the Australian women′s Opals basketball team by 16.

2001, Australian Sports Commission, edited by Frank S. Pyke, Better Coaching: Advanced Coach′s Manual, 2nd edition, page 227

This, combined with a sycophantic basketball press in Australia, created a weight of expectation that was slowly crushing the young player. Four months before the Olympics, Opals coach Maher lamented that he was having ‘a few too many’ talks with her on how to cope.

2002, Cameron Stewart, “High Hopes”, in Garrie Hutchinson, editor, The Best Australian Sports Writing, 2002, page 38

She′d made the train on squad for the Australian Opals basketball team and also played rugby for the Sydney University woman′s team.

2009, Nick Ireland, The Popondetta Butterfly, page 34