U12 Club Championship - Day Two Newsletter
Sunday, July 01, 2012The crowd was again out in force for the second day of the tournament with lots of applauding and support coming from parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters and club mates with many girls and boys teams cheering each other on. The Day was full of activities with not only games but also a Coaches Forum, on court games with prizes up for grabs, and an autograph signing session and photo booth with WNBL Players Emma Randall and Kristen Veal.
The Coaches Forum was well attended with Former Australian Boomers Assistant Coach and National Basketball League Championship and two-time NBL Coach of the Year, Brendan Joyce, on hand to answer any question thrown at him to assist with coaching skills and player development. During the on court games and in particular the game of knockout we saw plenty of skills from the players with them continuously making their shots to stay alive in the game! The eventual winners took home a brand new spalding basketball as well as a mini basketball signed by Chris Goulding, which the second and third place getters received also. Our WNBL stars were then swarmed with our young talent who got autographs and a photo opportunity with the girls in our photo booth, with all photos being available for purchase at www.rossbarton.com after the event.
Now to the on court action, where we saw the girls continue in their Round 1 Pools with teams vying for a top two position to make the finals, whilst the boys entered their new pools with some interclub Association bragging rights on the line when the three South West teams ended up in the same pool!
In the Girls Competition Jazz Stars had a day of close encounters with a 23-20 win over North Brisbane Dragons followed by a 24-22 point loss against Swifts Comets who secured their spot as top of the pool with the win. Despite the loss Jazz have finished second in Pool B and earned their place in a semi-final. In Pool A Springfield Brumbies have shown that they are a mighty force after overcoming the previously undefeated Celtics in a canter 50-21. Despite the loss the Celtics will make a semi-final showing after outclassing the rest of the pool. Both Jazz and Celtics have a tough task ahead of them in the 9:00am semi-finals going up against the Ipswich based teams of Brumbies and Swifts respectively, who are yet to be defeated and have members of the successful U12 Ipswich Force Division 1 and 2 teams amongst their ranks.
In the Boys Competition Brendale Bobcats bounced back from their Day 1 efforts with two wins to now be in contention for the plate award. They will be out to turn the tables on the Highlanders after their narrow loss to them in their first game of the tournament. In Pools AA and BB we saw Ipswich based teams again setting the pace. Despite being plagued by illness, Swifts Comets catapulted their way into the semi-finals with comfortable wins and will now take on Runcorn, who took the honours of making it to the medal playoffs over Club rivals Rivercity and Algester. It was however, much closer on the other side of the draw for Brothers Heat who managed to remain undefeated but with all three games being by 13 or less points. Brothers will now take on Sheldon College in their Semi-Final in a bid to have two Ipswich teams in the Grand Final.
BQ would like to thank all teams for coming to our inaugural event and wish all teams the best of luck for their finals games.