A fantastic result in volleyball at the junior North Island tournament held in Rotorua during the past week. With 42 girls and 48 boys teams competing, competition was fierce with the some awesome skills for this younger age group displayed.
Coach Keith Macown had a tough road through to the quarters, meeting fancied Trident Girls but coming through with a 25-17 25-18 win to advance to the semis.
The semi against Havelock North saw a superb game by the girls, who completely dominated to take apart a team who had progressed through with some impressive wins. A 25-13 25-11 win was an indication to everyone that our team meant business and were ready for the final against the local rivals Bethlehem.
With a fantastic, closely fought game, a great display of kill blocks and an awesome team effort, the girls were victorious 26-24 25-23.
Captain Holly Boyle, Katie Wood and Amy Hunter were named in the tournament team, with Amy MVP of the tournament Amy Hunter. As always in any team sport the rest of the team was so important to this win. Those members were Alex Keating, Abi May, Georgia Tyrrell, Laura Thompson, Baillie Malbon, Natalie Bray and Gemma Ellis.
Our boys junior A also performed well. Meeting eventual winners Trident in the quarters was always going to be a good match up. The boys played well but went down 25-23 25-20, bumping them out of the medals. They downed Otahuhu 25-23 26-24 to make the 5th/6th playoff, finishing fifth with a 25-20 25-17 win over Tauranga Boys'.
Team members were captain James Gilling, Brad Hurn, Liam Matheson, Charlie Clague, Neal Redward, Adam Morgan, Mark Nicholls, Kyran Stone and Brad Shaw (injured).
The 9A girls were a creditable ninth in division two with huge improvements over the past eight weeks.
Our 10B girls were 12th in division three, 9A boys 15th in division three and junior B boys 10th in division two.
The first cricket boys had a home game against the Tauranga Boys' Colts and after 40 overs were 186-3. Rising star Chris Atkinson hit 41, well supported by Julian Bradley on 39. The Colts team were all out for 43, with Chris again featuring with the amazing figures of six wickets for eight runs.
There was double gold and a silver for our Year 10 beach volleyball athletes who attended the inaugural North Island champs. It was an all-Otumoetai final in the girls with Holly Boyle/Katie Wood taking out the final against Amy Hunter/Abi May.
James Gilling/Charlie Clague were gold medal winners in the boys' grade. With 26 teams competing it was great display of skills after a tough week at the indoor Programme.
Congratulations too to Abbie Meredith/Jessica Lacy, who took silver in the Year 9 girls, and Julia Hartley/Kaitlyn Maclean for their bronze.
Our cricket teams continue to perform well, albeit with a few forgettable games.
Another great win this week for the Intermediate premier in a game played in tricky conditions on a wet pitch. Credit must go to the Albion Cricket Club that produced a great condition ground considering the weather. Our boys batted well with Braden Brewer, our MVP this season, scoring an unbeaten 50 to help us to a total of 117 on a reduced 24 overs. Albion chased well but fell just short at 101-4 from 24 overs. Best bowlers for Katikati were Arashveer
Singh 2/10 and Angus Sydney.
Another win for the Katikati second XI against Otumoetai. Katikati batted first on another wet pitch, yielding just 93. Nyle Hammond was the best with a gritty 25. After a good team talk the boys bowled extremely well to roll Otumoetai for 75, with Braden Brewer 3/8, Nick Taylor 2/3 and captain Mark Telford taking two vital wickets.
The first XI A match to forget against Tauranga Boys' College Reserves. We won the toss but the coach made the mistake of opting to bowl on a wet wicket and our fast bowlers were unable to bowl at full pace. Even though we were able to restrict Boys' to 138 runs off 36 overs, our batting let us down again with only Scott Nicol getting into double figures. He ran out of partners, scoring 25 from the team total of 66. Hayden Revell and Logan Brewer bowled well
with Hayden taking 4-25 from eight overs and Logan capturing three for 20 off seven overs.
A loss by 72 runs in a game that we should have won had we had another batsman able to make some runs.
What a great way to finish the school year with outstanding performances by three of our students. Firstly, congratulations to Owen Miller who finished fourth in the open men's division of the the Tinman triathlon. This event signals the start of the triathlon season.
Owen completed the swim leg in 16.49, bike in 1.03.49 and run in 38.49 to break the two-hour barrier.
Josh Taylor, a Year 9 student, had his first major surfing win in the under-14 Rip Curl Grom Search series held at Piha in Auckland over the weekend. Josh won the final on his last wave, scoring a 4.55 to take the victory by 0.15 points from Dune Kennings (Whangamata). The next event in the series is on Waitangi weekend at Mt Maunganui.
Trudi Greig, who has been playing football in the Waikato/Bay of Plenty women's team, had a great game last Saturday against the NZ under-17 women's team at Links Ave, winning 8-0. Trudi arrived home after the game to find an invitation in the post for her to trial for the NZ under-17 team in January.
Aquinas Colleges' young sportsmen and women are finishing the year in nothing but sheer glory.
The college's athletes took away top place at the recent Bay of Plenty zone schools' athletics day, finishing first with 80 points, followed by Bethlehem College with 66 and Central zone with 65.
Aquinas' successes are as follows: Year 8 Boys 100m sprint, 1st Matt Strong, 2nd Ben Short; Year 8 Boys 300m sprint, 2nd Angus Raiman; Year 7 Girls 800m 2nd Lili Crombie; Year 7 Boys 800m 1st James Sharp, 3rd Cayne Dew; Year 8 Grils 800m 1st Anneke Grogan; Year 7 Girls 1500m 2nd Lili Crombie; Year 7 Boys 1500m 1st James Sharp, 2nd Cayne Dew; Year 8 Boys 1500, 2nd Matt Strong; Year 7 Girls High Jump, 2nd Grace Eglinton; Year 7 Boys High
Jump, 2nd Liam McFall; Year 8 Girls High Jump, 1st Lauren Dennehy; Year 8 Boys high jump, 2nd Justin Priestly; Year 7 Boys long jump, 3rd James Wood, Year 8 Girls long jump, 1st Lauren Dennehy, Year 8 Boys long jump, 2nd Devin Kellett; Year 7 Boys 4x100m relay, 2nd Aquinas, Year 8 Girls 4x100m relay, 1st Aquinas; Year 8 Boys 4x 100m relay, 1st Aquinas CollegeAquinas College entered a cycling relay team in the iconic Around Taupo Cycle Classic
and finished in second place in the intermediate division. The team comprised James Sharp, Lili Crombie, Callum Hoare and Tom Carter. They completed the race in five hours and 52 minutes. Each of the team members had to bike 40 km over the tough course around Taupo with all of them completing their part in under 1 1/2 hours.
Year 10 student Sean Gibbs represented the Tauranga under-18 team at the underwater hockey nationals in Nelson just recently and came away with a silver medal. He has also been invited to trial for the national under-17 team.
The Tinman Triathlon last weekend was no huge hardship for Alice McFall who finished second in her division of the sprint section.