IVP Netball: NUS beat NTU 47-30 to clinch first ever championship title

By Justin Teh/crossroadsports.net

Singapore Polytechnic, Wednesday, February 1, 2012 — The National University of Singapore (NUS) beat the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) 47-30 to win their first ever Institute-Varsity-Polytechnic (IVP) Netball Championship.

It was NTU’s second successive IVP final loss after they had last won the IVP title in 2009. They had beaten the defending champions Temasek Polytechnic (TP) 60-38 to earn their place in the final.

For NUS, they finished the 2012 championship unbeaten in all their five games. They outscored their three group opponents by a collective scoreline of 204-92 to average 68 goals scored per game while only conceding an average of 31.

In their semi-final against the Singapore Institute of Management (SIM), NUS were 48-26 victors.

NUS possessed certain advantages over NTU in the area of height and cohesiveness. The majority of their players had been together since secondary school and also played in the same club team.

However, NTU proved they could not be taken lightly as they managed to take an 11-10 lead at the end of the first quarter. However, NUS appeared unfazed as their shooters found their rhythm and their defenders converted some turnovers.

NUS maintained a three-point lead for the most part of the second quarter before pulling away to a six-point, 24-18 lead at half time.

Realizing that they were losing considerable ground, the NTU coach began to make some changes to the line up. The NTU wing defense (WD) was moved into the wing attack (WA) position and new players entered the court to replace both the WD and goal defense (GD) players.

However, no matter what NTU threw at NUS in the third quarter, NUS still continued to push through the NTU defense and get most of their shoots near the post area. The strength and height of the NUS pair of shooters made it extremely difficult for the NTU defenders to handle.

At the other end of the court, NTU began making several passing and shooting mistakes in their attacking side and lost precious possessions which gave NUS an opportunity to open up a comfortable lead. The almost perfect pairing of the NUS GD and GK took almost every rebound and gave no breathing space for the NTU shooters.

Worthy of mention is the NUS goal keeper (GK) who displayed almost inhuman agility, reaction and stretch to dominate the goal circle. Her partner’s selfless effort in containing NTU’s GA and working the ball down court was equally impressive. The third quarter closed with NUS leading by 16 goals (39-23).

NUS kept their winning line up for the fourth quarter while NTU made further changes in the hope of closing the gap and winning the title. NTU moved their WA into the center (C) position and the GD for the first two quarters stepped back into the court.

With such a comfortable lead in the fourth quarter, NUS continued their bombardment into their attacking goal circle. But they appeared more relax and could even afford a smile when the timing of a pass into the goal circle was off.

NTU put up their final assault in the final 15 minutes and played their hearts out to the final whistle but they could not stop NUS from taking the championship title at 47-30.

It was a worthy final because both teams displayed that perfect balance of sportsmanship and competitiveness.

As much as the NUS success of a first title should be celebrated, let us not forget to celebrate the journey that NTU made to be one of the finalists. Despite their limitations from the beginning of the season, they fought hard and made it to the final. Kudos to NTU, especially their GK who challenged every lob, pass and shot from shooters that were bigger and taller than her.

In an earlier game, TP beat SIM 54-51 to finish third.

Ed’s note: If you can help us with the names of the players in the positions mentioned, please do so in the comments section below and we’ll update the post. Thanks. : )
IVP Netball Championship — full fixtures and results