Hayley Tallentire. Photo supplied.Ashburton College’s netballers have finished with a win to finish 15th at the New Zealand Secondary Schools’ Netball Championships in Nelson.

They took on Samuel Marsden College in the play-off for 15th yesterday morning and won it 33-30, to ensure they finished the tournament on a high.

It was a tough tournament for the young College side, failing to pick up a win until the final day, although they came close on more than one occasion and gave some much larger schools a real run for their money.

The tournament got under way on Tuesday and after losing all of their pool games, the Ashburton girls found themselves in the lower half of the draw.

On Thursday morning they took on St Mary’s College, a team that finished fourth at the lower North Island tournament, as Ashburton College did at the South Island tournament.

Down by one at half time, Ashburton College – led by Samantha Holden – applied a lot off defensive pressure, creating multiple turnovers which were converted by Hayley Tallentire at the shooting end.

The girls were determined to maintain that pressure, but St Mary’s came back and turned the score around to be leading 29-27 at three quarter time.

A couple off crucial turnovers in the final quarter saw the game slip away from the Ashburton side, eventually going down 36-40.

Tallentire continued her fantastic tournament, shooting 32 out of her side’s 36 goals.

After a short turnaround the Ashburton girls were back out on the court, this time against Napier Girls’ High School, and the Napier side came out off the blocks firing and before the Ashburton girls knew it they were down 13-30 at half-time.

It was a game of two halves, with Ashburton clawing their way back into it, only losing the third quarter 10-11 to be down 23-41.

All Ashburton players made it on court and the side’s two youngest players, Year 10s Ella Pearson and Billie Surridge, both put in great performances, as AshColl won the last quarter 10-7 for a final score of 33-44.

Without a win, they went into the 15th place play-off, which they won.

© The Ashburton Guardian - 11 October 2019

Poppy Kilworth. Photo supplied.Ashburton College have come agonisingly close to recording their first win at this year’s New Zealand Secondary School Netball tournament.

In their first game of post pool play yesterday, they faced off against St Mary’s College.

Having battled against some of the biggest named schools in the country such as St Kentigern College over the first two days, AshColl started strongly against their Wellington rivals.

By half-time in the game they were leading by two goals, with the scoreboard reading 21-19.

In the third quarter St Mary’s were able to swing the advantage and led by three goals at stages, but AshColl never dropped the bit, keeping the scores close.

Eight minutes in to the fourth quarter St Mary’s were able to extend back out to a three-goal lead.

AshColl cut that lead to one at the five minute mark, and levelled the scores with four minutes and 23 seconds left on the clock.

From there the game went goal for goal, with St Mary’s holding the centre pass advantage that meant AshColl had to score every time just to keep the scores level.

Eventually that pressure told and St Mary’s were able to turn the ball over with one minute 30 to go, and were able to score quickly, extending the score to 40-36 by the final whistle.

In their first post pool play match on Wednesday afternoon AshColl faced off against a very familiar opponent in Villa Maria.

Half-time saw the game locked up at 17-all, but a drop in intensity in the third quarter by Ashburton saw them trailing by seven going into the last quarter.

A strong fight back from AshColl saw them get within three off Villa, losing 32-35.

Grace Adams was exceptionally strong on attack and was backed up by Poppy Kilworth in the mid court, who turned over ball at critical times on defence.

When the team needed the ball near the end off the game Mia Pearson came up with two crucial turnovers.

By finishing within three goals off Villa the College girls gained a critical point, something the team thoroughly deserved.

In their third game of post-pool play, AshColl faced off against a sharp Napier Girls’ High School side that was fresh of a victory against Villa Maria.

Napier started strongly, and led 15-7 at the end of the first quarter.

They kept the pace going strongly and worked to an unassailable lead of 30-13 at half-time.

From that point the AshColl girls got up to speed, but were never able to take much off of Napier’s lead, trailing 41-23 at the end of the third quarter, with final score of 48-33.

By Jaime Pitt-MacKay © The Ashburton Guardian - 10 October 2019

Ashburton’s trio at the national short course championships was (from left) Mitchell Veix, Blake Farr and Hannah King. Photo supplied.Medals, personal bests and a Canterbury record made for a pretty good New Zealand Short Course Swimming Championships for three young Mid Canterbury swimmers last week.

Mitchell Veix, Blake Farr and Hannah King were the three members of the Ashburton Swim Team who attended the meet, which was five days of full-on action at the Sir Owen Glenn National Aquatic Centre in Auckland.

Farr led the way for the Ashburton trio, claiming gold in the 100m freestyle and bronze in the 200m freestyle, as well as earning him positions in the finals at night in both the 200m and 400m freestyle.

Farr secured top 10 placings in all of his six events and also came away with an impressive 100 per cent personal best (PB) rating.

King also set PBs in five of her seven events, and gained six top 10 placings.

Her biggest PB came in the 1500m freestyle, where she beat her previous time by 22.59 seconds and finished in sixth place.

It was also a time strong enough to see her break the 13-year-old girls’ Canterbury record, which had stood since 2012, and with the winner of the event finishing 31 seconds ahead of King it showed the calibre of competition across the country at the national event.

King also gained a spot in the C final of the 200m breaststroke.

Veix also swam strongly in his events, gaining a seventh placing in the 200m butterfly, while he also set two new PB times in his 200m butterfly and 400m freestyle events.

© The Ashburton Guardian - 7 October 2019