Stuart McLennan
Former Newtown assistant coach and Greece national team coaching staff member Jim Pizanias will be on familiar ground when he takes over the reins as head coach of the NSW Universities Men’s team.
Having taken the field for NSW in the 1990s when he was an accountancy student at Sydney University, and then appointed assistant coach for Australian Universities on two separate occasions including 2010 when the team were undefeated on a tour of England and France, the former St George and Newtown player is well aware of the value of representative Rugby League for university students.
"It's an honour to be appointed the head coach," Pizanias said.
"The program represents the best of the student athletes in our state. It’s good to coach those kids and see what they can do against the best of Queensland.
"Our record against Queensland could be better, having lost the last two so, I am looking to turn that around in Brisbane this year using my experience coaching at NSW Cup and international level.
"There’s only a couple of ways a player can put on a NSW jersey and not a lot of people get the opportunity to do it so it should be on a higher pedestal in my opinion."
Pizanias, who was part of Nathan Brown's coaching staff at the Newcastle Knights and coached Cronulla-Sutherland Sharks in the UNE Harold Matthews Cup, will also take the first Greece Under 19s team to the European Championships in France later this year.
NSW will play QLD in Brisbane in May this year with the date and time to be determined. Nominations for NSW Universities player selection will open in the coming weeks.
