There will be a familiar face on the opposing sideline when the Essex Rebels open their season this weekend.
As Tor Freeman takes charge of his first game as Head Coach, the opposition will be Caledonia Gladiators — and among their roster will be his sister, Tia.
It is an unusual way to begin a first season in charge, but for the Freeman siblings, basketball has always been something they have shared.
“I obviously want us to win but I hope she plays well, at least!” Tor says with a laugh.
“I know her really well, she knows me the same and it should be great fun. She used to play here too so she’s got a lot of friends on our team. We’re just excited for the whole experience.”
The pair’s relationship with basketball began relatively late.
Neither grew up immersed in the sport. Tor did not start playing until secondary school, when basketball was a major part of the sporting culture at their school and benefited from strong connections with Worthing Thunder.
“I knew nothing about the game before that but once I started Tia and I both got into it,” he says.
“Daniel Hildreth was the coach, so was my P.E. teacher, so the game was big in our secondary school and had good connections to Worthing Thunder. Cam Hildreth went to school with us too, and he’s obviously gone on to do great things.”
Tor played a variety of sports growing up, but basketball quickly became the one that stuck.
He continued playing until around the age of 20 before making the transition into coaching, joining the Oaklands Wolves junior programme during the final year of his university studies.
The move was helped by another Freeman connection. Tia had previously played at Oaklands, giving Tor an introduction to a programme that would become hugely influential in his development as a coach.
It was there that his potential on the sideline began to become clear.
Tor took one group of girls through a four-year cycle, watching them develop from young players into athletes capable of competing at higher levels. Some have since gone on to play in SLB.
The work earned him UK Sport’s Young Coach of the Year award.
“I had a really good group from when they were aged 12 to around 16 and saw really good progression with a lot of the girls in regional squads and that kind of thing,” he says.
“I was really lucky to be nominated for the award by one of the parents.”
The circumstances made the achievement all the more unusual.
It came during the COVID-19 pandemic, while Tor was also studying for a second undergraduate degree at law school and working alongside his studies.
When the award ceremony came around, he was in a night class.
“I remember when I found out I’d won I was doing my second undergraduate degree, so I was at law school and doing night classes because I was working a job,” he recalls.
“I remember saying to my lecturer I needed to step out because I was part of this award ceremony then I came back in 10 minutes later to say I’d won.
“Then it was just a case of congratulations and get back to studying criminal law… as you do.”
It was a memorable moment, but it was the coaching itself that kept drawing him forward.
Tor entered the professional game in 2022, joining SLB under Lee Ryan at Oaklands. Working with a young group alongside experienced professionals and imports gave him his first taste of the demands of the league.
“I enjoyed being allowed to do things the way I wanted to and being allowed to make mistakes as well. I got great guidance from Lee, and we had three really good imports who I learnt a lot from too.”
Since then, his coaching experience has continued to broaden.
He spent time as a head coach with Loughborough before moving to Anglia Ruskin, where the circumstances were very different. His players were balancing basketball with demanding academic and professional lives, including a medical student and a PhD student at Cambridge.
“It was really different too as a lot of the girls had jobs as well or were studying, but it was fun getting the best out of them in two or three sessions a week and seeing what we achieved together.”
And once again, there was a Freeman connection.
Tia was part of that team.
“I was lucky to have Tia playing for me, too. I had lots of experienced players and we moulded together over the season, kept our diaries clear for the play-off run and we had the characteristics in the team to get some really good results.”
Coaching his sister has become one of the most distinctive parts of Tor’s journey.
But their relationship has always been bigger than basketball.
In fact, Tor remembers a time when Tia wanted absolutely nothing to do with the sport.
“When she was at school she didn’t want to play at all. My dad and I were telling her she could be really good at it, but she wanted to play hockey and wasn’t interested in basketball.
“But eventually she gave in and she’s had a really good career so far.”
The pair have remained close throughout their respective journeys, regularly discussing games, performances and ideas.
“We talk all the time about results over the weekend, things we’ve seen that we liked and we’ve always supported each other. Last year it was so valuable to have her with me.
“We would drive to practice together and have a chance to talk through things, how we were going to do one thing or another and go back and forth on the best way to do it, and it was really enjoyable.
“I don’t think there’s many people that get to coach their sibling or be coached by their sibling and win something, so it’s pretty special.”
Now they find themselves on opposite sides.
“Tia got the schedule for this season before I did so we had fun discussing that and it’s going to be really exciting. I obviously want us to win but I hope she plays well, at least!”
There is genuine excitement rather than tension about the occasion.
And once the opening tip goes up, the sibling relationship will take a back seat.
Because for Freeman, this season represents the next step in a coaching journey that has taken him through almost every level of the game.
Now, at Essex, he wants to bring those experiences together.
“The Rebels programme has grown a lot year-on-year,” he says.
“The results on the court are the most visible indicator of that, but off the court as well you can see there’s something big being built here.
“It’s not just a university programme, it has a big footprint in the community and that’s really exciting, not just for the women’s team but the whole programme.
“My coaching experience has been varied so I’ve had a lot of different roles at different levels which is no doubt going to help build something on and off the court here.
“The challenge now is bringing all of that together and almost having to do all the roles I’ve done before at the same time, and not just elements of it.”
The ambition is both immediate and long-term.
“We want to have success in the short-term, of course, but in the long-term our aim is to see players progress from the junior club right through to the professional team and making an impact in the game. That has to be our aspiration.”
There is already a foundation to build on.
Several players remain from last season, bringing continuity and experience, while Freeman sees a healthy mixture of backgrounds within the squad.
“There’s some good continuity in the roster from last year, they can set the standard and the idea of success that they’ve had over the years, and there’s a nice blend within the squad of players from different backgrounds.”
When Freeman walks onto the sideline this weekend for his first game as Essex Rebels Head Coach, there will be plenty of new experiences waiting for him.
A new team. A new responsibility. A new chapter in a coaching journey that began almost by accident after he picked up a basketball at secondary school.
And, rather unusually, his first opponent will include someone who has been part of that journey from the very beginning.
His sister.
For one game, at least, Tor Freeman and Tia will be on opposite sides of the court.
But whatever happens when the final buzzer sounds, there will be one thing they can both relate to.
The game that brought them together in the first place.