AHL Heats up with Wins for Diamonds and Thundersticks
Western Australian Institute of Sport hockey athletes have helped both the Diamonds and Thundersticks continue their push towards retaining their AHL titles.
WAIS athletes dominated the score board as the WA Diamonds maintained their undefeated start in 2009, with a 5-2 success over the Southern Suns in Adelaide.
As has become customary this season, the Diamonds shot off to a brilliant start and found themselves 3-0 up at the half-time mark through goals to Hope Munro (4min), Shelly Liddelow (12min) and Ashleigh Nelson (23min).
The Diamonds domination continued into the second half with Lisa Eglington (36min) stretching WA’s advantage before Jemma Buckley (49min) became the fifth and final WAIS athlete on the score sheet for the match.
The Southern Suns did manage a last resurgence through Carly Simms to pull the score back to 5-2, but not before the result was beyond doubt.
Diamonds Coach, Sally Bell, said “We created a lot of scoring opportunities; however we were too casual in the second half, and need to raise our baseline level for the whole game, not just for certain periods.”
In the second match of the double header, the WA girls responded to Coach Bell’s frank assessment and put in a consistent performance throughout, to take the second match 5-0.
Goals to Ashleigh Nelson, Jayde Taylor and Sam Gale in the first period were extended through a second to Gale and field goal to Gemma Buckley in the second half, as WA continue to set the benchmark in the women’s competition for 2009.
Having witnessed a marked improvement in concentration, Coach Bell was happy to see off the Suns over the two matches.
“It was a more consistent performance for both halves, and we are happy with the result,” she said.
The WA Thundersticks were made to work considerably harder for their double header success, taking both games 2-1 with the first win coming in extra-time.
The Southern Hotshots lived up to their billing in the opening stages of the first match by taking a 20th minute advantage through Matthew McGregor. The Thundersticks, for all their endeavour had to wait until the 62 minute before WAIS athlete and recent Kookaburra representative Ian Burcher pulled back the deficit via a field goal.
Travis Taylor proved the hero in extra-time, netting the winner just 90 seconds into golden goal time.
The Thundersticks extended their season record to five wins from six games after defeating the Southern Hotshots 2-1 in the second clash on Sunday.
Darwin is the next port of call for the Thundersticks as they prepare for a double header meeting against the Northern Territory Stingers.