Two teams from the North and one from the South Island laid down the challenge when completing the opening two days of the FUJIFILM Business Innovation NZ Secondary Schools Netball Champs with a clean sheet in Porirua on Wednesday.
At the end of round robin play, eight teams remained in contention for the title with the top two from each pool playing the first of the cross-over matches to further enhance and define their title credentials.
In a confidence-booster heading into the business end, Christchurch’s St Margaret’s College, Hamilton Girl’s High School and Avondale College remained the only unbeaten teams after four completed rounds and 32 matches had been played out.
St Margaret’s were pushed all the way by a determined Trident High School, Whakatane, before prevailing 33-29. Nothing much separated the sides, Trident getting as close as levelling the scores in the third quarter but the southerners were able to extract themselves into clearer air time and again.
Trident had the better of the shooting percentages but St Margaret’s kept their noses in front thanks to holding the edge in the possession stakes.
``As the games get closer and tighter, you’ve got to be really careful with ball you do have,’’ St Margaret’s assistant coach and former Silver Fern Julie Seymour said.
``Today everyone just had to do their job and it took us a while to adjust to their style but it’s good at this stage of the tournament to be playing under that kind of pressure and practising performing under pressure.
``It’s not often we come to tournament of this magnitude in this position, there’s some pretty talented netballers here, so we’re not getting ahead of ourselves and it’s the old adage of taking it one game at a time.’’
Shooters Te Ata Hassan and Ivy Brown shared the load expertly for St Margaret’s with 19 and 14 goals respectively while Trident goal shoot Amanda Redmond had a memorable outing when potting 27 from 31.
With the next generation of the Rasmussen netball dynasty playing a leading hand, goal shoot Priscilla Rasmussen, with a near-faultless return of 36 goals from 38 attempts, Avondale College ended a strong challenge from defending champions St Peter’s School, Cambridge with a 46-38 win.
Avondale coach Rachel Rasmussen, mother of 16-year-old Priscilla, couldn’t be happier with how her young team is tracking.
``Our first goal was to make top eight, now we’re gunning for that top four and hopefully getting in the final,’’ she said.
``I’m really proud of the girls and happy with the progress. Most of our team are Year 10 and 11, so we’ve got babies right throughout, they’re amazing kids and I’m just so proud of what they’ve done so far. They’re hard workers and I couldn’t ask for much more.’’
Hamilton Girls’ High were too good for Dunedin’s Columba College, posting a 29-17 win as they continued to build on their buffer throughout the match.
``We’ve had quite a disrupted build-up, so we’re happy that we’re winning. Sometimes it hasn’t been pretty but a win’s a win and I’m proud of the girls because it hasn’t been easy,’’ Hamilton Girls’ coach Kim Howard said.
With the one loss apiece, the well-performed St Kentigern and Howick Colleges cannot be ruled out of the picture as they look to bounce back strongly as cross-over matches continue tomorrow ahead of Friday’s final place play-offs.
Earlier in the day, Hamilton Girls’ High, Avondale College, St Kentigern College and St Margaret’s College topped their respective pools with perfect three-from-three records after the completion of round robin play this morning ahead of the 16 teams being split into a top eight and bottom eight.