Top 16 Teams Selected For Secondary Schools Tournament

Top 16 Teams Selected For New Zealand Secondary Schools Tournament

Media Release
Monday 9 September 2013

The sixteen teams which make up the New Zealand Secondary Schools (NZSS) tournament next month have been decided after Regional qualifying wrapped up last week.

There were a record 252 Secondary School Netball teams contesting the three Regional qualifying events throughout the Winter Tournament Week with 108 teams at the Howick Pakuranga courts in the Upper North Island event, while 64 teams converged on New Plymouth for the Lower North Island tournament and 80 teams met at Christchurch Netball Centre to vie for the South Island Secondary School titles. Not only do these three events involve over 2,500 players but they also see over 250 coaches and umpires and numerous administrators and volunteers work tirelessly to support and promote the development of netball in secondary schools.

The culmination for the teams in the “A” grades at each of the of the Regional qualifying events is to make it to the NZ Secondary School Netball Championships and this makes the event one of the most hotly contested on Netball New Zealand’s event calendar. It will be held at the AMI Netball Centre in Auckland in the second week of the New Zealand school holidays from Tuesday 8 to Friday 11 October.

South Island qualifiers
- St Margaret’s College from Christchurch, attending for their third consecutive year.
- South Otago High School from Balclutha, attending for the first time since 1998.
- Waimea College from Nelson, also returning for their third consecutive year.
- Christchurch Girls High School, returning to the competition for the first time since 2003.
- Southland Girls High School from Invercargill, also coming back for the first time since 1998.

Upper North qualifiers
- Mount Albert Grammar School from Auckland, defending champions and returning for their tenth consecutive appearance.
- Pukekohe High School, competing for the very first time at the NZSS tournament.
- John Paul College from Rotorua, also competing for the first time at the NZSS.
- Baradene College from Auckland, making their second consecutive appearance.
- Auckland Girls Grammar from Auckland, making their 17th appearance out of 21 years at the Championships.
- Westlake Girls High School, making their second consecutive appearance.

Lower North qualifiers
- St Mary’s College from Wellington will compete for the seventh time at the NZSS
- Tu Toa from Palmerston North were finalists in 2012 and will return in 2013.
- New Plymouth Girls High School have had a three year absence from the tournament and will return for the 11th time
- Wellington East Girls College will compete again for the third consecutive year.
- Palmerston North Girls High School, this will be their fifth consecutive showing from 11 appearances at the event overall.

The 16 teams will be divided into four pools of four teams to compete in a round-robin format, with the top two teams in each pool moving onto the Quarter-Finals stage. The lower eight teams will compete play out for final positions.

Played indoors at the AMI Netball Centre in St John’s, Auckland, the competition is sure to attract big crowds with five teams from the Netball Northern Zone competing. The draw, results and daily match reports will be updated regularly on the Netball New Zealand website.

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