A sports charity that educates nearly 2,000 young people each week about the dangers of knife crime alongside coaching in basketball skills, has scooped the Overall Award at The Charity Awards 2014.

Newham All Star Sports Academy, based in East London, so impressed the judges with its Carry a Basketball Not a Blade (Cabnab) initiative that they felt the charity deserved not only to win the Children and youth category, but also the top accolade of the night.

The charity’s founder and director, Natasha Hart, collected the trophy from Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts and John Low, chief executive of Charities Aid Foundation, overall sponsor of The Charity Awards.  She said: “This is unbelievable and unreal - a huge achievement. I have to mention all of my team, parents, volunteers, funders, players – I couldn’t have done it without the young people.  Thank you for this recognition, this means we can go for another 30, 40, 50 years! Thank you.”

Nassa was founded in 2006 after Natasha took her two sons to the local park to play basketball.  Other youths joined in and by the end of the session 30 youngsters were playing.  Their potential was obvious, as was their need to gather in a safe environment and have fun, so Natasha arranged more such sessions.

Two years later a friend of one of Nassa’s players, Anthony Okereafor, was killed in a knife attack, prompting Anthony to look for ways to warn the club’s young constituents about the dangers of carrying knives. This required putting Nassa on a more formal footing and it was registered as a club with England Basketball.

Older players were invited to become coaches and Nassa enrolled them all on accredited training courses to gain qualifications.  A local primary school was offered extra-curricular basketball sessions in return for use of its gym for club training.  The school sessions were held before and after school and at lunchtime, and the coaches mixed skills training with talks and mentoring about knife crime.

Within weeks, 16 other schools in Newham had asked the charity to run sessions for them.  Now Nassa runs extra-curricular basketball sessions for up to 30 children at each of 65 East London primary schools across five London boroughs.
Club coaching also finishes with mentoring and question-and-answer sessions on knife crime.

Nassa established a code of behaviour to which everyone sticks.  When parents of players bullied match officials during a game, the young club members created a code of conduct for parents.  Not one has breached it since.

The charity is certain that Cabnab has directly contributed to the 46 per cent reduction in serious youth violence in Newham in 2013.  Its work has drawn plaudits from Newham MP Stephen Timms, local Met Police commander Robert Jones, and Prime Minister David Cameron.