The Medway Park Crusaders Basketball Club have announced they will bring back their defensive anchor, 6’6” big man JP Dimandja. The athletic Londoner is back for his third season with Crusaders, after playing every single game of the 2008-09 campaign. His leaping ability and improving positioning have helped him capture three of the top five rebounding games in Crusaders history on his way to a club record 190 rebounds last season.

“JP has been a real force for us on defence over the last two seasons”, says Crusaders head coach Mads Olesen, “and he’s still improving. His rebounding is incredibly important to us, and he has shown real improvement in his offensive game. For a few single games last season he looked downright dominant on the offensive end and our goal this year is to get more consistency into his game. If that happens he can be really scary at both ends”.

Dimandja had a big part to play in several big wins for Crusaders last season. When a short handed Crusaders team visited Plymouth in December for a double header he came up with 14 points and 17 rebounds on the Saturday against Plymouth Raiders and 18 points against Marjon Cannons on the Sunday, leading the team to two big wins. He was also responsible for setting up the improbable win against Leeds with a block of a wide open Christoph Roquette with ten seconds left in that game.

Crusaders have announced four signings for next season’s team – new captain Sam Betts, Damian Lyons, James Harris and now JP Dimandja – all of whom have played for the team for the last two years. Crusaders club president Jesse Sazant is pleased to have Dimandja back with the rest of them: “JP’s commitment is a real plus for us. We see him really developing and becoming one of the standout players in our league. His defence and rebounding have been key for us over the last couple of seasons. His signing added to the previous commitments of Sam, Damian and James gives us a solid core fort next season.”