Magic claim thriller
It wasn’t always pretty, but the Waikato-Bay of Plenty Magic won an exciting opening Super Sunday Premiership match 50-49 against the Central Pulse at Stadium Southland.
There was plenty at stake heading into the game with this battle between the second and third placed teams always set to be close.
Both teams were guilty of plenty of turnovers, with a combined total of 68 turnovers and 129 penalties conceded in the match as both teams struggled to stamp their authority on the game.
‘‘That one really hurts actually, one goal,’’ Pulse captain Katrina Grant said on television afterwards. ‘‘Up and down, a very defensive match I think.
‘‘Holy heck after that first two or three minutes I was like ‘this is us, we’re finding our feet, this is how the Pulse are going to roll’.
‘‘We just lost our way a little bit, we just stopped trusting each other, we stopped attacking ball on D and it showed and they came back into the match and [I’m] really gutted.’’
Some early turnovers saw the Pulse race to an early 4-0 lead as the Magic made a nervous start.
The first quarter saw both teams struggle to gather momentum, guilty of lacking the finesse through midcourt.
The Magic clawed their way back into the match towards the end of the first quarter, to take the lead 12-11 at the end of the first quarter.
The messy first quarter ended with 34 penalties, the Pulse gave penalised 22 times to 12 and a total of 22 turnovers.
The experienced Magic midcourt started to show their class and find South African shooter Lenize Potgieter with relative as they stretched their lead to three goals midway through the second quarter to 19-16 and kept increasing their lead to 25-20.
The tall combination of Casey Kopua and Kelly Jury made their opponents work harder to get the ball into shooters Cathrine Tuivaiti and Tiana Metuarau.
Goal shooter Tuivaiti was kept relatively quiet in the first half with 10 from 12 as the Magic took a 26-23 victory into the second half.
The Pulse started the third quarter better with some improved defence getting some crucial turnovers.
They levelled the scores at 28-28, before the Magic kicked into action and got back into the lead, only for the Pulse to get back into the league before the scores were locked up at 31-31 midway through the third quarter.
The Pulse then shot out to a 35-32 lead as Silver Ferns defender Katrina Grant who was moved to the goal keep position to mark Potgieter grabbed some crucial intercepts.
The Magic had the better of the final stages of the third quarter to finish ahead 39-38 heading into the final quarter.
A couple more Grant intercepts kept the Pulse in the match as both teams struggled to assert their authority on the game.
Both teams rolled the subs as the Pulse clawed their way into the lead 44-41 with nine minutes remaining.
The Magic lacked the fluency in the final quarter, but held on to win an exciting match 50-49.
The Pulse have to back up with another game tonight when they play the Southern Steel.