College sport: Representing NZ

Otumoetai
The 1st XV lead the Rugby Baywide Division 1 competition after beating Opotiki College on Saturday.
The game was locked at 7-all at halftime, but in the second half, the backs used the ball well to score two team tries.
Jay Michalik was again in outstanding form. His speed and evasiveness were too good for his opponents.
The forwards continue to do the important job of controlling the game. Kingston York impressed with his strong running and Scott Sleghs with his ability to secure the breakdown.
Zeppelin Kissling led the team from halfback and made several big breaks during the game. Overall, Otumoetai were too strong defensively and their commitment at the line was exceptional.
This win has put the college in a strong position and they now must travel away to face Western Heights in Rotorua this weekend.
The Baywide Junior Basketball Champs were held in Rotorua recently. Our boys' team played some great basketball to take the title with comfortable wins over John Paul College and Aquinas.
The junior girls had two good wins over Bethlehem 72-12 and John Paul 60-30, then came up against eventual winners Rotorua Girls losing 36-26. Our senior girls performed well but lost all three games.
The senior boys had a great result also at the Baywide basketball champs.
The boys played John Paul College and Mount Maunganui College, beating each by 40 points.
They played Tauranga Boys' College for the overall championship. Our team led for the whole match, beating Boys' College by 79-63.
This is the first time that Otumoetai have been the junior boys and senior boys Baywide champions in the same year.
Congratulations.
Derone Ruakawa is the key point scorer but is very ably assisted by Adam Braddock, Jamal McGruer and Theo Johnson. Alex Schipper continues to improve with an impressive dunk move in the final looking easy !
At the recent senior BOP rock climbing champs, Meika Watson was placed second in the Y12/13 grade.
Our boys' football team continue their unbeaten record this season with a 5-0 win over Rotorua United. Charlie Clague had a good game with Taylor Cresswell scoring twice and Daniel Rodriguez scoring a hat trick.
Congratulations to the following players who have been selected into Netball BOP rep teams. Abi May U17 Premier, Julia Hartley U17 Gold, Emma Jarvis U15 Blue. Congratulations to the following players who have been selected into the Harbourside U15 Representative team - Taelyn Smythe, Michaela Isaac, Claudia Richardson, Shavanah Cresswell.
Aquinas
The Eglinton family's sporting gene is doing swimmingly well with two siblings currently competing internationally in water polo.
Aquinas College pupil Grace Eglinton and one of her elder sisters are both representing New Zealand this month.
Grace left for Australia this week where she is a member of the NZ under 15 water polo team currently competing in the Trans-Tasman series in Brisbane, and then later in the challenge series against North Sydney Beach in Auckland in September.
Charlotte leaves next week for Hungary and then Canada as a member of the NZ water polo youth team.
Grace, who is a Year 9 student, has also clocked up the accolades in surf lifesaving and swimming. In the surf lifesaving under 14 nationals (Oceans 11) at the end of February, for example, she scored gold in the under 14 girls' board rescue, and then silver in the under 14 girls' tube rescue.
A month later, in the Swimming National Age Group Championships, she qualified for four events, the 400IM, 100 free, 200 free and 2001M. In the latter she was ranked 112 and went on to finish fourth in the final with a nine-second personal best and BOP Longcourse Record.
Grace is the youngest of four girls.
Tori, Emma and Charlotte were also lifeguards, with Charlotte representing Mount Surf Club - and gaining medals - at the nationals.
All the Eglinton girls swam competitively with Greerton Swimming Club, qualifying for BOP championship events. Tori and Charlotte qualified for National Age Groups and Charlotte was four years NZ junior qualifier, and Grace three years junior qualifier.
Charlotte had many years of successful swimming in the under 13 category, holding several LC and SC BOP records and winning eight New Zealand junior age group medals.
Te Puke
Shooting: Our boys shooting team have competed in a number of events recently, at the Bay of Plenty Open Max Hales winning C grade, with Tony Beaver placing second. In other C grade results, Tony Beaver placed third at the South Auckland Open, first at the Waitomo Open, second at the Cambridge Championships and first at the Whakatane Champs. Max Hales placed second in C grade at both the Cambridge Champs and the Whakatane Champs.
In the trap shooting event at the BOP District Champs, Tony Beaver placed second in both the C grade double rise and the single rise events and has now been promoted to B grade.
Basketball: In Friday's Baywide Secondary Schools Basketball tournament, our senior boys' team were drawn in the same division as teams from Reporoa College, John Paul College and Bethlehem College.
After being comprehensively outplayed by the Reporoa team for a first-up 38-71 loss, the team were encouraged to see that they would have a height advantage over their next opponents, the Senior B team from John Paul College.
The scores stayed close throughout, but with Shae Horne top-scoring with 18 points, Daman Deol scoring 11 and Keaton Ryder 9, the Te Puke team were able to close out a 55 points to 52 win.
Girls' 2nd XI Hockey: The girls' 2nd XI hockey team played their rain-postponed match with Tauranga Girls Juniors on Saturday.
A classic goal scored off a PC by Kristy Oxenham was followed by further goals to Nicole Pislor and Patrea Ter Steege for a 3-1 win. In Monday night's competition semifinal match, the Te Puke side's territorial domination went unrewarded as the Katikati College defence held firm to take out the match by 2 goals to 1.
Penny Bristow played a great game on the wing, repeatedly delivering the ball into the goal circle. The Te Puke team will now be playing-off for third or fourth place in one of next Monday's term 2 competition deciders.
Bethlehem
The past week has been filled with a range of sporting performances from Bethlehem College students in a wide range of disciplines.
In netball, in addition to the junior rep players reported earlier in the term, more BC players have gained representative honours.
Sally Davenport, Ashley Frew and Kelsey Randrup have been selected in the Premier U17 BOP Team with Tamsyn du Toit selected for the BOP U17 development team. Libby Drake has gained selection for the premier U19 BOP team. This is a fantastic effort by the girls and a good reward for the hard work they have put in so far this season.
The senior open A netball team are playing well and in their last game had a convincing win over Katikati College 61-23.
Tamsyn du Toit and Kelsey Randrup both contributed very solid games in the win.
The BC rugby 1st XV played against Taupo-nui-a-tia on Saturday in a home game. The boys started very slowly to everyone's frustration and found themselves down 17-6 with only 15 minutes to play.
However, fortunately for the team, both Tim Richards and Ben McBride were able to score tries and with a solid kicking performance from Jarrod McNaughton, the boys came away with an 18-17 win. Player of the day went to Ben McBride.
The girls' 1st XI hockey team had a busy week, playing two games. One was in Hamilton against the Federation Cup team, Hillcrest College. Despite Hillcrest's much higher ranking, the girls played confidently to secure a 2-0 victory. This game was a good outcome as on the previous night the team were frustrated to come away against Tauranga Girls College 1st XI with only a 3-3 draw.
The boys had only one game and in a hard-fought contest, they managed to squeeze out a 1-0 victory over Tauranga Boys' College 2nd XI.
The BC girls 1st XI football team had a great game against Whakatane High. Although the result was only a 0-0 draw, the girls were very satisfied since Whakatane had recently drawn against a team that had beaten the BC girls 16-0!
The other sporting highlight has been the exchange with Putararu College. This exchange has gone on for a number of years and is an event that the students look forward to each year.
The majority of our teams were successful. The results are as follows, in the football the Junior Belles Girls and the Junior Milan Boys each won 4-2. Both the 1st XI teams had wins with the girls' team winning 7-0 and the boys' team winning 8-0. All four netball teams also had wins with the Y8s winning 50-1, junior A 18-15, the junior B 40-18 and the open A 74-20.
In basketball, the senior A girls lost 18-39 while the senior A boys had an excellent win 74-20.
Putararu continue to have strong rugby sides and managed to defeat three of our four teams. The successful team was the Colts who had a convincing win 31-0.
Finally, our school chess team has been playing to a high standard. In a recent tournament they played Tauranga Boys' and won 13-8. Ray Chan performed exceptionally well and was the only undefeated player. They are now looking forward to the regional competition. - Hannah Marshall and Mat Smalberger, Sports Captains
Tauranga Boys'
The first XV played Palmerston North Boys' High School in round 4 of the Super eight competition last weekend. The 2nd XV fixture was a close game in the first half with PNBHS going into the break 12-3 up.
TBCs defence let in two second-half tries to eventually go down 3-24.
The first XV had played PNBHS in a quad tournament earlier in the year and lost by a large margin.
PNBHS were fresh from defeating World Champions Hamilton Boys' High School by 20 points. TBC First XV had their work cut out but implemented a game plan based on strong defence and positional play.
This was to be a sound plan as the boys led 12-9 at the end of the half. Unfortunately we weren't able to keep up the resolute defence and let PNBHS in for four second-half tries to go down 29-12.
In other rugby matches, the U15 A defeated Opotiki 2nd XV and the U14 A had a come-from-behind last-second win against Whakatane U15s.
Adam Steens won the BOPSS Intermediate grade for rock climbing, and the TBC squash team were crowned BOPSS champions thanks to a last game win by our No5-ranked player.
In football the TBC junior team won the inaugural "Hillsdene Trophy" junior invitational tournament without conceding a goal.
They defeated Hastings Boys' High, New Plymouth Boys' High, Palmerston North Boys' High and St Peter's. Congratulations to Connor Probert and Charlie Hillier for making the tournament team and Charlie Hillier was awarded the Golden Boot for his seven-goal haul.
Welcome back Sonny Hirini, who finished ninth at the U19 World Beach Volleyball Championships and we wish Talor Walters the best as he attends the Junior Wakeboarding World Champs in Milan.
Tauranga Girls'
After a hugely exciting week with the exchanges, this week hasn't cooled down any more. Basketball, rock climbing, hockey and running have packed our results.
Our senior and junior basketball teams competed in the Bay of Plenty Championships, both coming out with successful results in division one. Each of the teams came second, losing to Rotorua Girls' High School in the finals. Early next term we will have a chance to reverse these results during our annual school sports exchange where we compete for the Peter Snell Trophy.
Also there was the Bay of Plenty senior rock climbing championships. Irmak Thompson won the Year 12 and 13 individual girls section with 385 points. Melanie Jackson gained third place in the same section with a total of 360 points. As well as awesome results through the individuals, Tauranga Girls' College managed to win second place in the teams event, gaining 1880 points, just 30 points short of the winners.
Hockey has had a very successful week. The 1st XI beat Otumoetai 1st XI 1-0 in a great game. Amy Robinson played a super game. Nicky McCool is a member of the Bayleys Otumoetai women's hockey team, who played the final of the Midlands Intercity league in Pukekohe on Saturday. This was played against Fraser Tech, which includes a couple of past students of Tauranga Girls' College.
Nicky's team won 3-2 in golden goal extra time, making for an extremely exciting final.
Jessica Bitcheno competed in the Kawerau half marathon on Sunday, winning the U20 age group despite only being a Year 9 student. She completed the 21.2km race in 1h 50m. This is a great run, as she was also placed fourth in the North Island Cross Country in Taupo the day before. - Zoe Wieringa
Mount Maunganui
With only two weeks to go to the end of the term, the competition is hotting up for our winter sports teams.
The girls. netball had a fine Friday night and MMC1 had a good run out against TGC League 2, winning 51-20 to remain tied for 1st equal with TGC Prems, BC College, and Otumoetai. Other netball teams in the top three on the tables are Mt Rurus, Kowhai, Rimu and Green.
The boys 1st XV had a solid 38-0 victory against Katikati, although Kati had some key players out with injury. The game was played in good spirit with the Mount forwards dominating and playing some good running rugby reflected in the scoreline.
Home ground advantage was also great with a number of spectators at the game.
The U15 Mauao Boys were down for top of the table clash against Rotorua Boys' but RBHS defaulted. The boys are away this weekend in Kawerau.
The U14s had a good hard game against Te Puke, who are leading the table, going down 26-10 in a great game of rugby.
The school hockey teams have been posting some awesome results with the senior boys playing the final of the Stephen Graham Cup, beating TBC White 5-2, the first trophy round for the season.
The senior girls played the semis in the Samantha Charlton Cup and beat OTC 2nd XI 3-1 and play Aquinas next week in the final.
The junior boys' basketball team won division 2 at the BOP junior secondary school champs played in Rotorua and the senior boys finished fourth in division one and senior girls third also in division one BOP champs held in Tauranga.
Sports leaders Joel Widmer and Leah Marumaru Flynn organised a fantastic Polar Bear plunge last week in memory of a fellow student who lost his battle with leukaemia this year.
Sporting celebrity Dame Susan Devoy braved the elements and took the plunge along with Magic netball star Jodi Todd and ex-NZ waterpolo player Brandon Horan. Over $800 was raised for the Leukaemia and Blood Foundation.