![]() Sabljak at the 2017 IWBF Asia-Oceania Championships in Beijing in October 2017 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Personal information | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Full name | Ella Louise Sabljak | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Born | Moonee Ponds, Victoria, Australia | 17 October 1991|||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sport | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Country | Australia | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Sport | Wheelchair basketball | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Position | Guard | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Disability class | 1.0 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Event | Women's team | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Club | Queensland Comets (basketball) Bond University Rugby | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Medal record
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Ella Louise Sabljak (born 17 October 1991) [1] is an Australian 1.0 point wheelchair basketball and 2.5 wheelchair rugby player. She represented Australia at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics in basketball and at the 2024 Paris Paralympics, she won a bronze medal in wheelchair rugby with the Steelers. [2] [3]
Sabljak has hereditary motor and sensory neuropathy (type 2) which means the loss of muscle tone below the knee as well as in her forearm. [4] She studied education at Griffith University in Queensland, and is a qualified primary school teacher. [5] The university awarded her a full blue for wheelchair basketball in 2015. [6] [7] She lives on the Gold Coast with her partner Matt McShane, a wheelchair basketballer. [4]
A 1.0 point Guard, she began playing wheelchair basketball for the Brisbane-based Queensland Comets in the Women's National Wheelchair Basketball League in 2011. [8] The Comets won the league championship in 2014, a year in which she was named the league Most Valuable Player 1-pointer. In 2015, she averaged three points and four rebounds per game. [1] She also played with the mixed National Wheelchair Basketball League competition. [9]
In 2011, she was part of the Australian junior team (the Devils) at the 2011 Women's U25 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada, winning silver. [10] Four years later she was captain of the Devils at the 2015 Women's U25 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship in Beijing, again winning silver. [1]
She made her senior international debut with the Australia women's national wheelchair basketball team (the Gliders) that year at the Osaka Cup in Japan in February 2013. [11] She subsequently played for the Gliders at the Osaka Cup in February 2015, [12] the 2015 IWBF Asia-Oceania Championships in Chiba, Japan, in October 2015, the Osaka Cup in February 2016, [13] [14] and the 2017 IWBF Asia-Oceania Championships in Beijing in October 2017. [15]
She represented Australia at the 2018 Wheelchair Basketball World Championship where the team came ninth.
At the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, the Gliders finished ninth after winning the 9th–10th classification match. [16]
She was a member of the Australian team that won the silver medal in the 3x3 Women's tournament at the 2022 Commonwealth Games.
Sabljak classified as a 2.5 player won her first world championship gold medal at the 2022 IWRF World Championship in Vejle, Denmark, when Australia defeated the United States. [17]
At the 2024 Summer Paralympics, she was a member of the Steelers that won the bronze medal defeating Great Britain 50–48. [18]