Photo credit - Joe Serci TACKLD Photography

Story courtesy of College Sport Media

Wellington Girls’ College and Scots College are the 2024 Wellington hockey secondary school Premier 1 champions.

The two schools won their finals in difficult conditions, in persistent rain and blustery wind at the National Hockey Stadium on Friday night.

Wellington Girls’ College beat Wellington East Girls’ College 3-0 in their final and Scots College defeated Wellington College 2-0 in theirs.

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Wellington Girls’ College are forming a dynasty on this title – this was their sixth Premier 1 win in succession since the first in this run in 2019.

WGC had beaten WEGC in last year’s final too, coming back from an early deficit to win. But not this year – after a goal-less first quarter the top qualifiers made sure of the 2024 silverware with a blistering three-goal burst in the second quarter to establish their 3-0 win by halftime.

After an even opening 15 minutes, the final came alive barely two minutes into the second period when WGC opened the scoring. A short cross across the posts and a re-bound off the goal-keeper paid off as Lucy Turnbull scored from close range.

WGC made it 2-0 off a penalty corner and some clever passing between Kate Chandler and Ted Gempton and the latter finding the back of the goal.

Then came the goal of the match.

WEGC pressed hard to try to pull one of those goals back, but WGC turned defence into attack from deep inside their own territory, with captain and centre half Lucy Pottinger being heavily involved – as she explained:

“One of our defenders, Eli Cook, made a turnover and passed to Lucy Turnball who laid it off to me and I made a run down the right side and swept it from the baseline to Ted Gempton who flicked it in.”

“It was such a nice goal, that was really fun being part of that.”

There was no further scoring, although WEGC had a couple of clear chances in the third quarter and WGC then dominated much of the fourth quarter and if not for the wet surface more goals could have been scored.

Captain Lucy said that at 3-0 with half the final still to play WGC were in the box seat. But weren’t going to sit on their laurels.

“Easts can definitely make a comeback. The first game we played against them this year we almost drew with them until we scored a goal in the last 40 seconds. So we knew

that they were going to a tough team to beat. This was also our third year playing them in this final, so we knew how much they wanted to win it.

“They had some more shots on goal, but our keeper Ellie MacAvoy did really well saving us there.”

Lucy said Both teams had to respect the conditions. “But living in Wellington we are all used to the wind being a factor. And we have played in rain plenty of times – we played a game at Kapiti with a flooded turf and the ball couldn’t move more than 5 metres!”

“The NHS turf takes on water well, so we didn’t find it too much of a factor apart if being a bit cold in our warm-ups and needing to be able to communicate with each clearly during the match.”

The latter consideration could have been a problem, as Lucy and her teammates cheered themselves hoarse supporting their Second XI in their final against Scots College. That game was 1-1 but WGC won on a penalty shootout.

The win for WGC was extra special for vice-captain Kate Chandler who played her 100th match for her school First XI in the final.

This was also Lucy 99th match – she will bring up her 100th cap in the first game of the upcoming Federation Cup tournament.

Both Lucy and Kate have grown up and played together since aged 5. They made the WGC Second XI together and then the First XI in year 10. The reason why Kate has played one more match than Lucy? “We have both missed matches through injury, but I didn’t play once because I went to the Wellington College school ball.”

Lucy and Kate and six other year 13s in the WGC team have one more hockey assignment to come, the annual NZSS Secondary School Federation Cup tournament. This year’s tournament is from 2-7 September in Hamilton. WGC are also the only Wellington school going to the Federation Cup this year and they are drawn with Christchurch Girls High School, Kings College and John Paul College.

The winning WGC team was: Ellie MacAvoy (GK), Lucy Pottinger (C), Maya Carden, Sienna Partridge, Maia McKee, Georgie Pennicott, Bella Manning

Elliot Guest, Ellie Cook, Kate Chandler (VC), Jessie Holland, Sarah Davenport, Georgie Cameron, Nell Laracy McCrystal, Lucy Turnbull, Theodora Gempton

Head Coach: Lesina Pereira. Assistant Coach: Kahu Kirikiri. Manager: Jo Hiles. Assistant Manager: Phoebe Pottinger

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Earlier, Scots College beat top qualifiers and favourites Wellington College 2-0 in the Premier 1 Boys decider.

Drizzly conditions set in just as the final was getting underway, which proved somewhat of a metaphor for Wellington College’s performance, struggling to settle and harried into mistakes at both ends of the field by Scots.

A tense opening period saw scores locked at 0-0 after the opening quarter.

Wellington College made a promising start to the second quarter but were checked on at least two occasions, before Scots struck with their first decisive goal of the final five minutes in.

Counterattacking from the centre of the field, a cross caught Wellington College short of defenders in front of goal and Jack Marsden scored with a one-handed deflection to see his team go 1-0 up.

Wellington College went close just before halftime following fast foot work in the circle by striker Torban Whittle. This led to the first penalty corner of the match, but Wellington College failed to execute and Scots defended it away.

The start of the third quarter was also even, with Wellington College again missing a couple of sharp chances to equalise. The run of play stayed that way towards the end of this quarter when Scots scored their second and match-winning goal.

They made no mistake of their first penalty corner of the match and Foy Kerkin scored the goal to double their lead.

There was not further scoring in the fourth quarter as Scots held on to win the match and the 2024 title. Wellington College also had a played yellow carded midway through

Article added: Tuesday 27 August 2024