Hoop dreamer: How basketball saved a Belfast boy and his hopes for the Irish game

Gareth Maguire is Ireland’s most capped male basketball player but he says he’s merely its luckiest for how the sport gave him refuge during a troubled childhood.

Gareth Maguire during the All-Ireland Schools Girls Cup Final between Ulidia Integrated and Loreto Stephen’s Green at the National Arena in Tallaght. Pic: Eóin Noonan/Sportsfile

He calls his foundation Sport Changes Life because back in the day it changed – saved – his.

Gareth Maguire was a child of the Troubles in more ways than one. Outside it was Belfast while behind closed doors – though they were never locked in case a neighbour might have to pass through, gun in hand, to evade the army and police – Jim Maguire was waging another war of his own.