Northland yesterday scraped into the semifinals of the national women's interprovincial amateur teams golf championship semifinals for the first time.
Their 3 1/2 to 1 1/2 win over North Harbour saw them secure the second berth from section one, narrowly ahead of North Harbour.
Both teams earned eightpoints from section play but Northland won 16 individual games to North Harbour's 15 1/2 tally.
That lifted Northland into the playoffs for the first time since the semifinals format was introduced in 1999.
Unbeaten Auckland topped section one on 12 points, and will face Southland in today's semifinals when Northland will meet Waikato.
With Auckland already assured of top spot, attention yesterday was focused on Northland's match against a North Harbour side boasting an average age of just 15.
Northland needed to win 3 1/2 games to progress, something they accomplished after their No 1 Caroline Bon won the last hole against Rica Tse to earn the last point her team needed.
Northland fell from the spotlight after losing 4-1 to both Aorangi-South Canterbury and Auckland on the first day, but then won their next four matches, including an upset over 2007 champions Bay of Plenty.
Before Bon beat Tse, her Northland colleagues Phoebe Perrin and Aroha Tito had disposed of Hanee Song and Faye-Any Nickson at the 16th and 18th holes, respectively.
The necessary half came from Jenna Hunter, who was 2 down at the turn to Sunny Namkoong but fought back to level.
The nerves were obvious at the last hole, a par-four which was halved in sixes, with Hunter three-putting.
North Harbour's bright light was Lydia Ko, 11. She was only two-over par in winning the bottom singles contest 6 and 4 over Jo Wech to remain unbeaten on debut.
In the other section, Southland sealed their semifinals spot by beating Tasman 4 1/2 to 1 1/2 after being down 2-3 after five holes.
Waikato topped the section on 12 points after beating Taranaki 4-1.
Auckland's last national crown was in 1999, Waikato completed a double in 2000 and 2001, while Southland have only once previously made the semifinals, at home in 2003. Auckland secured their sixth successive win yesterday, 4 1/2 to 1/2 over Wellington while Bay of Plenty finished a disappointing week by posting a 5-0 win over Canterbury.
