INC OPEN MEN'S 2024

Day 1 of Men’s Nationals.

We had a very tough first day with a very tight grade and some very close games. With the huge depth of talent we have we were able to smoothly rotate all of our players on court throughout the day.

First game of the day we played Eastern Pakuranga and got a hard fought win 37-33.

Second game was a little too close for comfort against Counties Manukau but managed to hold on in the last few seconds to win 35-34. Final game of the day was played against the Northern Stormers and throughout the day the team managed to settle in to our routines and processes and closed out a decent but well earned win 45-30. Fantastic first day and the team came together well and fought hard for every win.

Bring on day 2 and our first game at 10.30 in the morning against Hawkes Bay.

Day 2 of Men's Nationals.

After a very tough Day 1, we were under no illusions that today would be the same.

We started with a very competitive first game against Hawkes Bay, achieving the win 34-29 .

Next up was Wellington who were sitting at the top of the table. After a hard fight right to the end, unfortunately we came away with our first loss although capturing the bonus point with the final score 36-38.

Last game of the day had us up against a more familiar team with Dunedin. After 5 combative games under our belt, we have a lot of sore and tired body's and unfortunately went down 33-45.

The results didn't fall our way today but the team remained positive and put their all out on court again today, even when some players were way out of position.

Bring on Day 3 tomorrow, with some sore and tired body's leading into with our final pool play game being a must win against Tamaki Makaurau.

Day 3 of Men's Nationals.

We had a great start to the day with a big win over Tamaki Makaurau 44-22.

This result sent us to a semi final against Eastern Pakuranga in the afternoon. The team were riding the high of a good win. Our afternoon semi final was a repeat of our first game playing Eastern Pakuranga. With some very tired bodies we knew it was going to be a tough battle from start to finish and after a nail biting 40 minutes we were unable to get the win falling just short 33-32.

Not the result we were all hoping for however we have a very proud coaching and management team and a fantastic effort from our wonderful physio to be able to allow the all the players to leave absolutely everything out on court.

The amazing amount of heart and resilience shown by these lads to push through strains and sprains are awesome building blocks to takeaway from this year and bring on to the next.