Ocean Grove’s Bellarine Netball League A Grade premiership was built on the back of trust and care for each other.
The Grubbers knew they needed to play the almost-perfect game to defeat Geelong Amateur in the grand final and almost perfect they were on the way to a 53 to 45 win at Newcomb’s Grinter Reserve.
Ammos had lost just one game for the season, but Ocean Grove didn’t care much for form or reputation.
Ammos struggled to deal with Ocean Grove’s full-court dominance. Every player performed their role.
The only downside was a serious knee injury to defender Kelsey Ollis in the third quarter, but Rhiannon Whitson stepped in to play her role with aplomb.
Ollis damaged her ACL, has a partial rupture of her MCL and has tibial bruising and will undergo surgery next month.
“We feel like we probably couldn’t have done it any better if we tried again,” co-coach and star goal shooter Bec O’Neill said.
“We just had to be steady and be in control from the get go. Otherwise, if you give Ammos even a sniff of a chance to take it from us they would have.”
Ammos scored the first three goals of the game and the Grubbers could have been forgiven for doubting themselves after falling behind early in their grand final loss last year.
“In the past, we’ve let them get up to, I think about nine or so ahead of us in the first quarter,” O’Neill said.
“We just said if it gets to five or more, we really need to change something up. But thankfully, I think it might have got to five, but that was the most we let it get to, and then we switched on.
“It takes a full team effort to beat them. The defensive pressure caused Ammos to make a few errors and then we just capitalised on it and the girls brought it down the court beautifully.”
O’Neill’s partner in crime Ashton O’Brien won the medal for best on court for a stunning game at goal attack.
“She’s just a runner, she’s just nonstop, just an absolute workhorse, she just keeps going,” O’Neill said.
“There was no stopping her.”
While Ocean Grove didn’t start poorly by any means, it conceded the first three goals, however nonplaying co-coach Candice Parker said she wasn’t in any way concerned.
“At the start I could see what we were trying to do and it was really just a couple of errors and we just needed to catch back up and next thing we’re level at quarter time and I was like ‘yeah, we’ve got a game on’,” she said.
“Something we talked about was getting really high hands. Restrict the ball that goes into (star Ammos goal shooter) Ruby (Watson). I think the defence did a really good job of hands over.
“We’ve watched the replay quite a few times, but we had hands over every ball and they were having to go backwards.”
Parker, who retired from playing at the end of last season and played in the club’s last flag in 2004, said coaching a premiership was different to playing in one. There are no regrets about perhaps retiring a year too early.
“I can’t remember the last time (2004), I think we partied too hard, but it was pretty exciting,” she said.
“But I’d only been at the club for a year when we won. It’s different having to watch. I think I’m just happy that I was a part of it, getting around the players and helping them get up each week and working on things.
“I was more than happy to retire and take this role.”
Captain Emily Moroney said her side saved its best performance for the final game of the season.
“We knew going into it that if we played like 75 percent at our best, we weren’t going to win,” she said.
“Everyone on the court and on the bench, the entire team has to be 100 percent ready and wanting it. We wanted it so bad and it showed.
“I think it was probably the best game we’ve played all year, so that was awesome to have that timing for us.
“It was a really fun, enjoyable game from my perspective. I think the first few moments of the game were a bit nerve wracking. We kind of fell away with a few things but then after that first three to five minutes, we got our heads back in the game and from there we really excelled and played our style of netball, which was awesome.”
After celebrations at the club on the Saturday night, Moroney hosted ‘Silly Sunday’ at her house and the girls enjoyed brunch together on Monday morning.
