Up-T-Hoop

 

YORKSHIRE AND PROUD was the message reverberating from the lips of the coaching staff neither of whom are Yorkshire natives; at the end of the Under 17’s Women’s Inter Regional Tournament Final Sunday afternoon. As the final buzzer sounded the exhausted Yorkshire side had gone down to the North West by 11 points in a thrillingly intense battle. The North West rattled off 5 points as the Yorkshire girls pressed in vain throwing every available ounce of effort in their attempt to overcome the deficit, so the final score flattered the tournament victors a little. Nevertheless circumstances of the tournament where what they were, and to be the best you have to beat the best and all those in attendance in Nottingham’s Wildcats arena witnessed the two best teams of the tournament provide a fitting finale that will struggle to be matched in future years.
A tired and somewhat flat first quarter saw the North West jump out to an early 14 point lead. It was visible to see that the team were clearly suffering the effects of a gruelling schedule that saw the Yorkshire team play 4 games across the span of almost eleven hours on Saturday, and a further immense effort to overcome a very talented East of England Squad in the Semi-Final just an hour and a half prior to the final.
The first quarter deficit proved to be the crux as Yorkshire would get no closer than 5 points to the North West throughout the remainder of the game. The coaching staff were left with no choice but to ask the tiring Yorkshire team to once again dig deep inside themselves, shrug off the mental and physical fatigue and fight back. As they had done all weekend the girls responded to their coaches call. A massive effort starting mid way through the second quarter saw the girls, sparked by efforts from the bench, leadership from captain Ellis Clayton and the teams superb ability to score at will against the tiring North West’s Zone Defence pull to within 5 at the break.
The momentum was clearly with the girls in the Yorkshire jerseys but foul trouble and inconsistency coupled by a relentless an increased intensity from the North West starters meant that Yorkshire soon found themselves back in a double digit hole. The remainder of the third quarter and the fourth quarter was played out on a pure adrenaline rush for everyone in the building, Yorkshire, North West or basketball enthusiastic neutral. The lead would be cut to 7 or on occasion 5 only for the fresh legs to arrive on court and spark a resurgence back to double digits. The Yorkshire girls were fighting tooth and nail with increased defensive intensity again and again. All the while managing to have a small lapse in concentration or positional mistake due to fatigue lead to an opening that the very experienced North West players were able to take enough advantage of to stay just far enough in front to force the Yorkshire hand.
With key players fouling out mid way through the fourth as the increasingly lob-sided foul count began to mount the coaching team were left with no choice to abandon the ½ court pressure defence which the girls had made look like a well oiled machine and press full court. The reality was that this time the team were being asked to do something they physically didn’t have enough left in the very empty tanks to be bake to do and claw back the 7 points they needed for victory. The often wrongly-minimised moral victory belonged to the Yorkshire girls in terms of amount of improvement from game one Saturday morning to final game performance. The old coaching adage of “good teams get better as tournaments go along” couldn’t have been more relevant by the time the 12 girls in Yorkshire jerseys held their heads high at the tournaments closing ceremony. Forget the tea, a remarkable achievement from a phenomenal group of ‘Yorkshires finest.’

Yorkshire U17 Regional Girls Team 1992 born:
Ellis Clayton (c) , Kendal James , Emma Burkinshaw , Rebecca Pinnock , Jasmyn Owen , Charlotte Carrick , Katrzyna Zajac , Holly Hodson , Fran Iwanyjkij , Pippa Burrell , Laura Wollerton , Sophie Miller

Tournament Results:
East Midlands : Loss 30 - 41
London: Win 50 - 28
South East: Win 43 - 33
South West: Win 46 - 16
Semi Final: East: Win 59 - 72
Final: North West: Loss 59 - 71