Pre Season Queenstown Tournament

Monday, 23 February 2009

It was a lead up tournament which almost didn’t happen for the LG Mystics but one they have now gained a certain amount of confidence from. 

The LG Mystics led by Temepara George and coached by TeAroha Keenan finished unbeaten in a pre-season tournament in Queenstown over the weekend despite nearly missing their first game.

They were supposed to fly direct to the Southern Alps resort town at 9am on Friday but storms hit the country, first forcing a delayed flight then a landing at Invercargill instead, followed by a two hour bus ride to Queenstown which had them arrive at 5pm for a 6.30 game against home side, the Southern Steel. With a quick bite to eat along with strapping and a 12 minute warm up the LG Mystics took the court and won the game 57-47.

There was also 70-60 victory over the Pulse with the big match against defending champs the NSW Swifts being a 58-53 triumph for the Trusts Stadium based side, a win which Keenan says could have been bigger.

“We should have beaten them by more. It was a bit of a see-saw match. We need to work on that sort of thing,” says Keenan who believes the team is coming together well as a unit after some intensive pre-season training and fitness work.

“One of the strengths of our group is the team unit. We’ve worked hard and been rewarded.” Keenan was pleased with all of her players and the efforts they put in, including the training partners, 19-year-old Bailey Mes (goal shoot and goal attack) and goal keep, goal defence, Sulu Tone-Fitzpatrick, 16 from St Cuthberts College in Auckland. “It was great for me to see them up against the other players and training hard.”

 

This week the LG Mystics change tact with their training and will visit the NZ Breakers for a talk with senior players Kirk Penney, Dillon Boucher and Tony Ronaldson as well as coach, Andrej Lemanis before watching the Breakers train prior to their important semifinal NBL playoffs.

 

Results from Queenstown pre-season tournament:

LG Mystics 57 Southern Steel 47

LG Mystics 63 AIS 51

LG Mystics 70 Central Pulse 60

LG Mystics 58 NSW Swifts 53