Squash: Two more national titles for Bay

BAY'S CHAMPS: Winona-Jo Joyce (left) and Whitney Nohokau both won their respective grades at the National Champion of Champions squash tournament. PHOTO/DUNCAN BROWN

TWENTY years without an A-grade woman and then two in the same year ... both under-17.

Hawke's Bay squash stalwarts were toasting their second A-grade woman for the season last weekend when 15-year-old Havelock North and Hastings club member Winona-Jo Joyce earned A-grade status when she retained her B-grade title at the National Champion of Champions tournament in Putaruru last weekend. Fellow member of the same two clubs, Rhiarne Taiapa, reached A-grade back in July.

"I knew at the beginning of the weekend if I won all my games I would reach A-grade. It was the goal," left-hander Joyce said as she reflected on her feat which was achieved after just four years.

After winning her first two matches in straight sets in Putaruru, Joyce beat Bay of Plenty's Karen Roberts 3-1 in her final.

A relation of former world No 1 Leilani Joyce, the Phil Drummond-coached youngster has set selection in the New Zealand under-19 team for next year's world championships in Tauranga as her next major goal. An eight-strong training squad will be announced early next year, from which the final team of four will be selected .

"Three of the four play in each fixture and the other player is a reserve. I believe the top three are virtually sorted and five others including Rhiarne and myself are battling for the other berth. If I don't make it I know I will still be eligible when the 2019 world championships are played.

Last weekend's title ended a memorable season for Joyce. The Hastings Girls' High School Year 11 student, who is eyeing a professional career when she leaves school, was a member of the Hastings club's B-grade women's side which won the national teams tournament at the Hawke's Bay club in September and last month was a member of the fifth-seeded Squash Eastern team which finished third at the Hamilton-hosted junior nationals.

The Technifibre-sponsored Joyce said she would not have been able to tick off her goals without the high-calibre junior training camps run by Squash Eastern and her Havelock North club. Tournaments on her 2017 schedule include the April Oceania championships in Auckland, the New Zealand junior graded champs in Cambridge and the national junior champs in Christchurch.

Almost as phenomenal as Joyce's feat in Putaruru was the one recorded by her Hastings clubmate Whitney Nohokau. Despite still being a first-season player Nohokau, 29, won the E-grade title with an unbeaten run and gained D2 grade status.

The head teacher at Little Sunbeams Early Learning Centre in Hastings, Nohokau, also won all three of her matches and beat Ohakune's Amoa Crossan 3-1 in her final.

"I have to give a lot of the credit to Dave. He has done a lot of work with me," Nohokau said referring to her coach Dave Drummond, the father of Joyce's coach and the coach of Nohokau's national title-winning Hastings F-grade women's team at Remuera in September.

"We're hoping some of our F-grade teammates will help us form a D-grade team for next year so we can give that title a crack. They don't mind the hard work Dave encourages us to do," Nohokau said.

A member of the national women's interclub title-winning Hawke's Bay Dodgers softball team in 2014, Nohokau has also played for national title-winning Hawke's Bay under-19 and under-17 teams in the past. This summer she is playing for the Dodgers Bay side which is unbeaten in Hawke's Bay senior B women's competition.

"It's been an awesome year on the squash courts and I would have the successes I've had without the tremendous support of family members," Nohokau, a mother-of-one, added.