SOME exceptional netball came to Island Park on Saturday and while the Cats recorded equal wins and losses across all games, tight scorelines – including the 11 & Under girls who went down by just two goals – made for great spectator sport.
The A Reserve and B Grade girls followed up great results in round 13 win another pair of wins, while the A Grade team recorded its highest score of the season.
In the juniors, the 17 & Unders continued on their winning way, while the 13 & Unders and 15 & Unders took one win each out of their two divisions.
FROM THE SCRIBES
Under 17
THE 17 & Under Side continued its role as the giant killers of the comp this past month, now laying claim to defeating the top two sides.
The Cats find themselves now sitting in third with two rounds remaining.
When these two sides met last time, the result was 17 goals in South’s favour, 21 the time before.
On Saturday, Casterton 51 defeated South 31.
The strength of the young Cats’ side is that there are no passengers.
In her 100th game for the Cats, Marissa Jamieson took the WD bib, combining with Ebany Jarrad and Phoebe Carlin to form a strong defensive unit, making the South attackers earn every ball and goal, strong hands over the ball resulting in multiple turnovers, sending the Cats into attack, time and time again.
Makayla Hutchins continues her strong form in the centre both defensively and in attack, forming a formidable partnership in with Madeline Patton at WA.
Goalers Chloe Foster and Ivy Lane are combining well and shooting with a high-level of accuracy.
At half time, the Cats held an 11-goal lead.
With a full side at her disposal, coach Jodie Humphries was able to make some changes bringing on Sophie Hart to WD, where she continues to show great improvement making life difficult for opposition WAs, blocking space and contesting every ball.
Jamieson moved to GD, Carlin to WA, Patton to C, Lane to GA and Zoe Hill into shooter.
Taking only two centre passes to settle into the new combinations, the young Cats didn’t falter for the remainder of the game, running out easy winners.
A Grade
A GRADE had one of their closest games for the season, falling short by seventeen goals and posting their highest score for the year.
The Cats side has been improving and were looking for the stars to align to get their first win for the season; unfortunately these stars were nowhere near aligning in the lead up to the game, with news that star mid-courter, captain and 350-plus gamer, Scarlett Jarrad, was ruled out with a ruptured ACL.
We all wish Scat a full recovery and hope to see her back on the court again when she can.
The news did not get any better on Saturday morning with the late withdrawal of Caeleigh Humphries, through illness.
If we look to take a positive from the bad, the omissions allowed the elevation of two more future stars of the club - Phoebe Carlin (17&U) and Indi Longhurst (15&U) named for their first A Grade games.
The game was always going to be a good battle with Casterton needing to limit the opportunities for the South goalies, who rarely miss from anywhere in the ring.
Charlotte Rice in her 100th game for the Cats, found herself back in the GD bib, Ebany Jarrad at GK and Tessa Marra WD, the defenders worked hard making the South goalies earn each attempt.
Makayla Hutchins took on the role of centre and debutante Phoebe Carlin at WA, to combine with regular goaling combination Madalene Cleary and Ivy Lane.
The most youthful side fielded for Casterton in many years, a few nerves were to be expected and adjusting to a new combination saw errors on the first few centre passes, resulting in turning the ball over and South capitalising.
The remainder of the quarter was almost goal-for-goal with centre passes, South taking a seven-goal lead at quarter-time.
The second quarter was a little of the same with a few unforced errors seeing the lead for South stretched to 15 at half time.
Desperate to stay in the game, the half-time break saw the Cats regroup, Marra and Rice swapping bibs and every player on the court upping their efforts with defensive pressure resulting in Ebany Jarrad at keeper taking intercept after intercept.
The Cats limited South’s Munro to only six and Duncan to five for the quarter, Makayla Hutchins working herself into the game to dictate where she wanted the play, Phoebe Carlin feeding with precision and Madalene Cleary and Ivy Lane creating space and opportunity in the ring.
Lane shot 12 from her 14 attempts and Cleary five from her seven, the Cats taking the quarter by six to reduce the lead to just nine at the final break.
The final quarter started in the same fashion with the Cats going strong, but unable to reduce the margin to less than eight, with the final five minutes of the game seeing the South side finish the stronger of the two, outscoring the Cats again.
Final score, South 60 to Casterton 43.
A credit to the young side, which saw four of the seven players playing their second game for the day.
The Cats’ strongest showing to date, hopefully that first win is not too far away and could come in one of the next two games.
13 & Under A
THE U13A girls had an amazing game of netball keeping the scores goal-for-goal in the first half.
Feeders Renee and Marlee passed the ball well into the shooters Phoebe and Makayla.
Defensively we had pressure all over the ball Rachel, Ylana, Chloe and Ella managing to get many intercepts and chasing up every loose ball.
Overall, the girls played really well, only going down by seven.
