IT was a hard-fought win for Portland’s Country Basketball League women’s side on Sunday, with the young line up securing an 83-75 victory against Horsham.

Nothing came easy to the side with the group forced to create their own opportunities defensively and making the most of them.

Portland pushed out to a 10-point lead early in the first term with some strong defensive pressure led by Lexie Petch and Millie Jennings in the front court while Tanielle Knight went to work in the paint.

Despite a strong lead from the home side early, Horsham levelled out their offence late and closed the margin on the scoreboard.

The tables turned in the second term with Horsham finding some more space to run their offence freely while Portland lapsed in their transition defence to trail by seven heading into half time.

Despite the change in momentum Portland rallied in the third term with regular defensive change-ups forcing Horsham to adjust.

Young captain Katie Zeunert said their focus for this week was defensive pressure and her side was able to adapt when it mattered.

“I think our defence worked and we played well defensively - which is what we were asked to do,” she said.

“We played really good defence last week against Warrnambool, so we knew we needed to bring that again this week which I think we did.”

Head coach Ellen Zeunert said they worked to slow down Horsham’s ball movement and was happy with her sides ability to respond.

“They were beating us a lot of in the paint, dishing the ball inside and we were collapsing a bit too much allowing them to dish it back out,” she said.

“Then we changed up our defence a bit just for a different look and that helped work through.”

The mother and daughter duo have both been impressed with the way the young side has stepped up and taken on leadership roles out on court.

“We try to change it up as much as we can from man to zone and sometimes we get a bit stuck but most of the time we switch on – that’s part of it, we need to be able to switch it up on court and it’s important that we’re switched on,” the captain said.

“When we have time outs that’s when mum likes to set the trap and shift our defence but she says it’s not about her always being able to call it on the sideline, we need to have to call it ourselves and she knows we’re young but it’s important that we can change it when we feel we need to on court.

“It’s good, but also a bit weird being one of the older ones. In saying that though, I feel like even Millie and Tyleah and other players are taking charge in their own ways. At the start of the season I thought I might have to take charge a bit more but I don’t have to the way I thought I would. Millie mainly takes point and then when she needs a rest we have plenty of people who can do the job.

“Everyone is really stepping up and we’re so versatile, everyone is able to get on the court. It doesn’t matter if we don’t have our traditional bigs on the court we have so many options – everyone can dribble or get inside and step up.”

The win on Sunday secured Portland’s spot in the finals with just one game left against a strong Mount Gambier line up.