Athletic are back in the winner’s circle as the North Otago Netball premier A competition approaches the business end of the season. They beat Old Boys 74-50 in a high-scoring affair during the latest round of the competition last weekend. Athletic piled on the points in the first three quarters to lead 60-31 heading into the fourth. Old Boys showed a lot of fight right until the end and ended up winning the the final quarter. However, it was too little too late as Athletic got the win 74-50. “It was a team performance,” coach Petra Aspros said. "It was all seven that were out on the court at any one time, played the game together and we played as a team. "We had drifted away from that a little bit so we came back together at training and had a bit of a discussion and we definitely put it out on court which was great.” Being able to play a number of different ways proved to be a real strength of the squad this year, she said. "We’re very versatile in our team which is great. "Changes can be made at any moment — we just need to adapt to those which we did really well on Saturday.” With just four games left before the semifinals, Aspros was pleased with how her team was tracking. "We’re getting to the nitty gritty part of the season now which is quite cool. "We’ve had a really cool season this season with a couple of new girls coming in. "Sometimes it makes all the difference to freshen things up and get some new legs out there and get their point of view.” The three unbeaten teams also won last weekend as Maheno beat Waitaki Girls’ High School in a tight game 60-53 while Valley Manawa got a 61-33 win over St Kevin’s College. Valley Ahi also beat Waitaki Girls’ Lightning Strike 71-29. This weekend will see at least one of those unbeaten teams knocked off as Ahi and Maheno l go head to head. Athletic are looking to keep their momentum rolling as they take on Waitaki Girls’ Wildfire. St Kevin’s will play Old Boys and Valley Manawa will meet Waitaki Girls’ Lightning Strike as well tomorrow.
