PORTLAND’S under-14 junior Coasters basketballers have finished off their representative season after a tough Junior Country Championship tournament in Traralgon across the weekend.

The Junior Country Championships welcome all country teams in Victoria to compete over the weekend for a state title.

Portland’s under-14 teams have been training since July and competing across the summer in tournaments throughout Victoria.

The under-14 boys had an impressive start to their Country Championship campaign led by coaches Greg Morrissey and Ebony Morrissey.

They dominated day one in their pool defeating Morwell, Foster and Maryborough, placing them into division four for the remainder of the tournament.

Day two saw some tougher competition for the Coasters when they lost to Wonthaggi and Melton before securing a strong victory against Leongatha.

Their efforts sent them into Monday’s quarter final where they took on Maryborough for a second time.

Despite earning a win on day one against Maryborough, the Blazers showed improvement and ultimately defeated the Coasters in a nail-biting contest, 49-47, to end Portland’s run in the tournament.

• The under-14 girls led by coaches Heidi Jones and Greg Morrissey had a tough run early in competition facing some impressive sides during the first phase of the tournament.

Playing four games on the Saturday the Coasters went down to Colac, Korumburra, Sale and Morwell.

This put the side into division five where they had some impressive results across Sunday.

After going down to Mansfield in the morning the young side rebounded with a 43-14 victory against Warragul.

The momentum continued with another strong win against Maryborough, 41-25.

In their last game on Sunday it was a thrilling contest against Melton where the Coasters fell just short in a one-point loss, 29-28.

On Monday the Coasters took on Phillip Island and couldn’t secure a victory, 44-34, seeing them just miss out on a semi-final spot.