The CMHA Men’s Hockey team finished their week of hockey at the 2014 Nationals on a high note after some patchy results earlier on.

By winning the 3rd/4th play-off match they achieved their highest ever finishing position at the HNZ National Tournament.

This season’s National Hockey Tournament took place in the first week of September at the North Harbour Hockey Centre in Albany.

Wearing the traditional tri-colour Counties-Manukau hoops the CMHA team rolled out their A game for the do-or-die play-off match and overwhelmed Tasman  8-2, a side they had  lost to three days before in the round-robin section of the event.

Remarkably, all ten goals in the play-off were field goals. Scorers for CMHA were

Grant Harris (2)
Phil Hook (2)
Glen Ellis
Cody Richardson
Anil Nathoo
Daniel Williamson

The Counties team made the play-off by finishing second in their pool but had to play their get-out-of-jail card on the first day. After losing to Wellington the overseers reversed the result because Wellington had breached the player eligibility regulations.

CMHA’s second place finish in the round-robin put them into the top four but they ruptured somewhat in the middle of the week losing to the eventual winners Canterbury, and, the NZ Defence Force, before thumping Tasman on the last day.

The CMHA Women’s team went on the same field-trip and made it clear they were not there as a support act. Also wearing the new hooped tops they too achieved a best-ever result.

The Women’s team finished the week with a draw against Wanganui giving them a share of seventh place.

The side, captained by Lisa Williamson, made an early statement of intent with victories over Wanganui and North Harbour on days one and two respectively.

But they double-faulted on day-three. In what was a mini-crisis, they lost both games that day going down to Canterbury and Auckland followed by a one goal loss to Tauranga on day-four.