L-R: Lara McCarthy, Emma Westhorp, Kate Richards, Chris McMichael, Jess(cuddles)Westhorp, Jane Elliot (Absent: Luisa Neo, Chloe Lim, Mel Perry, Kim Omond)

Pre-game:

The girls arrived at 930 as asked however in typical fashion we congregated at the wrong flinders basketball gymnasium. Who would have thought??? Flinders has two gyms on campus (pay attention Adelaide sports association!). Many desperate phone calls later we arrived and were confronted with a formidable Flinders university team. Despite Flinders being stacked with div 3 players and quality ring-ins our girls were equally focused.  Game time!…after an inspirational, coach carter-esque speech from Coach Chris;  Lara (Big Bird) McCarthy, Jane (Tarzan) Elliot, Chloe (The Hurricane #2) Lim, Louisa (The One) Neo and Kate (insert nick-name) Richards hit the hardwood leaving Jess Westthorp, Emma Westthorp, Mel Perry and super sub Kim Omond to warm the bench.

First Quarter:

Go Team !

The griffins came out firing! A successful tip gave “The One” the ball. Structured offence resulted in a duce under the ring from Big Bird. This set the tone for the rest of the quarter.  Coach Chris insisted on calling subs continuously and on the back of fast break offence and good post play the Griffins took an 8 point lead with them into the second. Score: 12-6 Griffins

Second Quarter:

Substitutions were taken and the influx of fresh legs caught Flinders off-guard as Adelaide extended their lead. Hustling defense from Mel, Steve Nash no look passes from Neo and fierce glass cleaning from Kim put the Griffs in a strong position. Flinders desperately called timeouts. Despite carefully chosen words from Coach Chris, AU went back on the court and tried desperately to lose out lead… The buzzer beat us to it as we went into the half 25-20.

Championship Quarter:

In similar fashion to the second the Griffins were throwing the game away. It required a 28-28 score line and a timeout to ruffle some feathers before the griffin’s spread their wings and took off with the game (most griffin related comments in one sentence perhaps???). 3 minutes of dominant basketball put the girls in a strong position going in to the final quarter.

Final Quarter:

No matter which combination was on the court the griffins played great basketball but could not blow the game open.  Flinders and AU went basket for basket for the last 4:30 with Adelaide University Griffins taking the game 51 – 46 and with it, the title of ‘SA University Champions’.

Congratulations girls! It was an impressive performance for a team, who had not played together.