The Cobar Senior Netball 2019 season got underway on Saturday with the first round of games commencing on the newly re-surfaced courts.
A Grade were up first with JKM Dynamic Fitness winning 47-22 over ENDivas in what surprisingly proved to be a one-sided match.
JKM’s Lauren Urquhart had the honour of scoring the first goal on the new courts and, along with Kym Sutton, the pair continued to pile on the points.
Despite being a player short, JKM dominated the game with their very tall new recruit, Chantelle Hamilton (playing in Goal Keeper), teaming up well with veteran defender Amie Hill to limit ENDiva’s scoring opportunities.
Best and Fairest points went to ENDivas’ Corrina Brenton along with Urquhart and Tanya Gilbert (JKM).
In the other A Grade game, Pumpettes were too good for Wildcats winning 56-27.
Pumpettes got the early jump on Wildcats (who are playing their first A Grade season) and scored 17 goals in the first quarter to Wildcats’ five. More consistent play in the second quarter saw Wildcats improve however Pumpettes finished as convincing 29 point winners.
Best and Fairest points were awarded to Pumpettes’ Hayley Walker and Zoe Carter along with Wildcats’ Samantha Lloyd.
Both B Grade games were closer matches than had been witnessed in A Grade.
Mystics narrowly won 27-24 over Ravens and Gumnuts beat BrushStop 50-41.
Mystics had a slightly better start than Ravens winning the first quarter of their game 4-2 thanks to strong shooting by Jasey Bruce.
Ravens made some positional changes and putting Heidi Palazzi into shoot paid off, especially in the third quarter when they outpointed Mystics 10 goals to four.
Ravens also bettered Mystics 9-8 in the final quarter but the consistent Mystics shooting duo of Bruce and Molly Negfeldt saw their team through to a narrow three point win.
Best and Fairest points went to Ravens’ Laura Barnes and Palazzi and Molly Negfeldt (Mystics).
Gumnuts took a big lead in the first quarter of their match with BrushStop to be up 31-8 at the first break.
BrushStop’s shooting combination of Jordan Warren and Stevie Toomey ‘clicked’ in the second quarter with the pair outpointing the Gumnuts shooters 10 goals to eight.
BrushStop made a great comeback in the final quarter to narrow the gap to just nine points the final difference, 50-41.
Best and Fairest points went to Toomey (BrushStop) and Gumnuts’ Angela Francisco and Carli Schulz.
