Bio
Just 10 days after he was selected for Australia’s senior indoor hockey team, Brett ‘Sticky’ Stibners was involved in a head-on collision, having fallen asleep at the wheel of his car. Lucky to be alive, he broke nearly every bone from the waist down and had to have his right leg amputated at the knee.
The then 21-year-old spent four months in hospital and, unable to return to work or hockey, he developed anxiety and depression.
However, being introduced to wheelchair basketball in 2003 gave Brett a new lease on life and in 2008 he made his Paralympic debut. Defeating long-time adversary Canada, his dream of Paralympic gold came true, a moment he and teammate Troy Sachs were confident would happen ahead of the Games when officials were practicing the flag-raising ceremony and the Australian national anthem played in the background.
Instrumental in the team’s impressive 2010 IWBF World Wheelchair Basketball Championship victory in Birmingham, England, Brett enjoyed an unbeaten run to finals at the London 2012 Paralympic Games to win silver, but at Rio 2016 the Rollers delivered conceivably their worst performance in over a decade, crashing out of the quarter finals in a 23-point loss to Great Britain.
Despite the disappointment of this loss, Brett feels privileged to be one of a lucky few to have achieved their ultimate goal in life, his being Paralympic gold.
