Ryan O'Handley

IHA President, Game Development Portfolio Lead

Ryan has been involved in ice hockey as a player, coach, official and administrator for more than 40 years in Canada, the USA and Australia and has a passion for developing players, coaches and officials. After moving to Perth from Canada in 2004, Ryan played and coached in the Cockburn Hawks Club from 2004-2009. He was the head coach of Western Australia at the 2009 Goodall Cup 100th Anniversary championship. In 2010, He moved to Adelaide and served as assistant coach of the Adelaide Adrenaline in 2010 and 2011 before serving as head coach from 2012-2015. In addition to coaching in the AIHL, Ryan also coached in the South Australian junior development program, coached numerous state teams at national championships and was state coaching director from 2011-2017. In 2012 and 2013, Ryan coached the National U20 men at the world championships and was appointed head coach for the National Men's team in 2014 and 2015.

In 2012, Ryan joined IHA as the National Player Development Director where he implemented the National Player Development Framework, a long-term athlete development plan for Ice Hockey Australia and its state association. In this role, he has organized 16 National Development Camps, and 8 McCrae-Williamson Jamborees and has presented at dozens of coaching clinics around the country where he shares his passion and expertise in training players through small area games. He was also invited to be a guest coach at the USA Hockey 2019 Select 15 Camp. Outside of Ice Hockey, Ryan is an Associate Professor in the School of Veterinary and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Adelaide.

Jane Woodlands-Thompson

IHA Vice President, High Performance & National Teams Portfolio Lead

With a background in Sports and Event Management, Governance and High Performance Coaching, Jane is currently working as GM of the Australian Masters Games. Her recent roles include General Manager of Women’s Sport at Collingwood Football Club overseeing the Club’s largest department in AFLW and Super Netball, and General Manager of High Performance at Netball South Australia. She was also the Coach of the one of the most successful teams in the ANZ Championship era, the Adelaide Thunderbirds.

As well as sitting on the IHA Board, Jane sits on Deakin University’s Masters of Applied Sport Science Advisory Board. She has presented internationally on coach education, is a published author of “The Netball Handbook”, and has completed a Masters of Applied Science in Sports Coaching. Jane embraces innovation and continually strives to inject creativity in search of best practice high performance programs.

Christine Harman BA, LLB(Hons) MBA

IHA Company Secretry, Governance, People & Culture Portfolio Lead
 

Christine is an experienced sports and events governance executive, having worked as the General Counsel for Cricket Australia, Cricket World Cup 2015, and the Melbourne 2006 Commonwealth Games.

Christine is currently employed in the role of Company Secretary for Treasure Wine Estates Ltd. Her experience spans senior legal and corporate governance advisory. Christine has worked across several industries, including Financial Services, Energy and Manufacturing, in a variety of corporate governance positions. This included General Counsel at the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games – one of many roles where she’s shown her exceptional stakeholder skills to demonstrate leadership and management abilities. 

Rachel Kogiopoulos

IHA Treasure, Finance, Audit, Risk & Compliance Portfolio Lead

Rachel is an experienced business leader having worked in lead financial and business roles in health care, minerals, and mining. She has proudly helped to transform industries through streamlining processes, introducing technology, and improving the culture and wellbeing for her teams and the wider organisation. Rachel is currently the financial controller at De Grey Mining Ltd a large Australian mining organisation. Rachel has a passion for contributing to the community and enjoys working with groups that align with her focus and strengths where she can really help to build their mission and achieve optimal outcomes for all.

Michael Juste

IHA Director, Information Technology Portfolio Lead

With over 25+ years of experience at the forefront of the technology, Michael is a distinguished Senior Technology Leader renowned for his strategic acumen and innovative approach. His expertise spans a wide spectrum, including strategy and planning, cloud technologies, service management, platform operations, architecture, virtualisation, and large-scale infrastructure ecosystems.

Michael has a proven track record of leveraging strategic relationships to expedite solutions, all while maintaining a governance approach that ensures successful organisational outcomes. His knack for aligning technology with business objectives has consistently driven transformative change. Michael has worked across other industries, including Government, Education, Retail, Private Sector and NFP. Michael continues to push the boundaries of what's possible, steering organisations towards technological excellence, and ensuring they remain agile and resilient in an ever-evolving digital economy

Suzanne Garas

IHA Director, Leagues & Tournaments Portfolio Lead

Suzanne has over 25 years’ experience working in Organisational Development and Human Resources. Holding senior leadership roles across a number of organisations in various industries, Suzanne works with business leaders to create high performance cultures where people can flourish and be the best versions of themselves.

Suzanne is passionate about ice hockey and has been involved at state and local levels since 2014. She has held positions with the Newcastle Northstars Board including Junior Program Manager, Tribunal Officer, Ordinary Member, Secretary, President, and Vice President; as well as taking on management positions for representative teams and tournaments at the local, state, and national level. Suzanne was instrumental in building the junior development program from the ground up to create an inclusive environment where kids of all ages and skill level are able to play hockey and thrive. Suzanne was recognised in 2022 by the Northstars when she was awarded with the Terry George Award for outstanding dedication to the Newcastle hockey community.

Karla Quinn

IHA Director, Communications & Marketing Portfolio Lead
 

Karla currently leads a large and premium Westfield Centre having spent most of her career in strategic and commercial property management. Karla has also led brand and marketing in an Australian Children’s not for profit, and started her career in marketing and communications for large ASX listed groups in Australia.

She has worked on high profile rebrand and marketing campaigns as well strategic internal and external communications and media advisory. Together with her teams, she has been afforded International award recognition for delivery of highly successful brand partnerships and sales driving campaigns. With a commercial, operational and strategic mindset, Karla has driven change and contributes as a sponsor to young executives. She lends her time to industry mentoring and coaching others to enable them to realise their potential. She is passionate about delivering meaningful value, a communications specialist and is customer centric.

Kathy Rogers

IHA Director, Governance, People & Culture Portfolio Lead

Kathy is currently working as a Specialist Human Resources Manager for CSIRO leading their early career programs. Previous roles have been within the policy, change management, workplace relations and recruitment space. Kathy's previous board roles have been for two South Australian community sporting clubs: Goodwood Saints Football Club and Matrics Netball Club. She is also familiar with the elite sporting environment, where she was the Team Manager for Adelaide Thunderbirds for three years and has represented Netball Australia as the Technical Match Delegate for all South Australian Suncorp Super Netball matches since 2018.

Jay Norden

IHA Director, Facilities & Commercial Portfolio Lead
 

Jay is career orientated property professional with over 20 years’ experience across a range of commercial real estate segments including retail shopping centres, retail shopping centre development and delivery, understanding the forensic detail of retail and commercial businesses and feasibility analysis of retail redevelopments. Jay also possesses an innate understanding of implementing strategies to grow retail and commercial brands across a wide range of sectors. He has been more recently working in segments within the Property Industry across Innovation and New Business ideas and Partnerships. Jay has previously also been involved in high level sports participation with the Sturt Football Club in the SANFL.

Adam Woolnough

IHA General Manager

Adam is a career sports administrator, having spent 20 years in the industry. He played professional rugby league in the NRL for 9 years with the Newcastle Knights, Penrith Panthers, and Melbourne Storm. After completing his rugby league career, he turned his attention to supporting Olympic, Paralympic, and Commonwealth Games athletes, coaches, and sports at the Queensland Academy of Sport (QAS). Adam implemented new community programs in hospitals and charity organisations, focusing on athletes connecting with their community. 

Adam accepted a role at the Australian Institute of Sport (AIS) to lead a new department focused on community engagement to take new and innovative ideas to a national level. Key programs were established with charities and organisations supporting mental health, diversity, and First Nations. During his time at the AIS, Adam was asked to oversee further areas within the AIS to include personal development, career and education, and the athlete wellbeing network across the high-performance system. In 2019, Adam was awarded the Australian Sports Commission (ASC) – Australia Day Award, for outstanding services to the ASC.

 Adam is a loyal and hardworking senior-level sports administrator that has an ability to connect with stakeholders at all levels. His mix of experience across high-performance sport, community, wellbeing, and partnerships, brings a unique and diverse perspective to IHA.

Martin Ceniceros

IHA Administrator - Registrar Portfolio Director

Martin is the main point of contact for the IHA Office. His contributions to Ice Hockey Australia started in 2019 whilst completing an MBA in Sport Management at Deakin University. He has been involved in several volunteer roles across AIHL, AWIHL and IHA, and many other sports including the Australian Open, F1, Presidents Cup, AFL, Cricket, NFL, and other not-for-profit organisations that support environmental awareness and animal advocacy. Martin also has over 10 years of international experience across many industries such as marketing, sponsorship and business development. He is a recreational athlete enjoying sports such as American football, ice hockey, soccer and marathon running.