Steel win probable if form holds
Accident puts game in perspective
STACK the rafters with light bluecoloured streamers and don’t hold back on the bubbly — the Southern Steel ought to win tonight’s ANZ Premiership final against the Pulse in Invercargill by 15 to 20 goals, if form is any guide at all.
The Steel swept through the round robin with 15 consecutive wins and is one win away from the perfect season.
The Pulse will come with a cork but its chances of crashing the party will probably get bounced at the door. The teams have met three times this season — the Steel won two of them comfortably and the other was a crushing 8044 victory in Porirua.
‘‘It has been terrific so far,’’ Steel coach Reinga Bloxham said when asked about her side’s superb season.
‘‘Those 15 wins we’ve had mean absolutely nothing [tonight], so we need to make sure we refocus on that [last] 60 minutes and get it done.’’
Fair enough. Play the game first, celebrate second. And it is always sensible to be on guard against complacency.
Last year’s conference final against the Magic is a good reminder what can happen when a team gets ahead of itself. The Steel was a firm favourite to beat the Magic but was stunned 5957.
‘‘I don’t know if we were mentally prepared enough going into that game last year,’’ Bloxham said.
‘‘We’ve had a look at that to see what we could have done better, so we know that is an area that we fell down and we definitely don’t want to do that this time.’’
The team discussed what when wrong and how it works its way through that pressure so it can be better equipped this time.
‘‘That’s important when you’ve got a lot of younger players in the team who have not experienced anything like this before. So that has been a focus for us and we have talked about it.’’
Those young players are likely to be on the bench, though, as captain Wendy Frew and shooter Te Paea SelbyRickit return from the injuries they sustained when the team van was involved in an accident in Christchurch earlier this month.
Bloxham said the accident helped put the game in perspective.
‘‘Strangely, the crash was a blessing because it took the pressure off winning. The focus has been on ‘is everybody emotionally and physically well enough to take the court [tonight]?’ It has brought a shift in mindset, I suppose.’’
The Steel was able to win in Christchurch with four of its players missing, including star shooter Jhaniele FowlerReid. That victory, perhaps more than any other, signalled to its opponents just how hard it will be to beat.
Stopping FowlerReid popping the ball in once she has it in her hands is fruitless, so expect Pulse captain and Silver Ferns defender Katrina Grant to go searching for the ball.
The Pulse will look to cut off FowlerReid’s supply of ball but that will not be easy with midcourters Shannon Francois and Gina Crampton in such good touch.
The Pulse rallied to beat the Northern Mystics 5952 in Sunday’s elimination final and boasts the premiership’s most effective defence, so it is the best equipped side to tackle the Steel’s formidable offence.
Shooter Cathrine Tuivaiti can more than match FowlerReid for accuracy but has put up more than 300 fewer shots compare with her opposite. And she will have Steel defender Jane Watson to deal with.
Watson has amassed 99 deflections — nine more than anyone else — and grabbed 38 intercepts, making her one of the tournament’s most effective defenders.