It was a good week for Harbour athletes with our U15 Girl’s rep teams performing with distinction and fine individual performances in the Sal’s NBL and for Northern Kāhu in the Tauihi Basketball Aotearoa.

However pride of place has to go to Bailey Flavell and the New Zealand U16 Women’s team.

In a thrilling encounter the U16’s beat Chinese Taipei 66-63 to claim bronze at the FIBA U16 Women’s Asian Championship in Jordan on Sunday. The first time a New Zealand women’s age-group team have medalled at and Asian Champs.

Bailey played a massive part in the game against Taipei as she hauled New Zealand over the line. She was huge down the stretch scoring nine of her game high 16 points in the fourth quarter as the Kiwis had to come from behind to claim victory – Bailey also claimed 12 rebounds in a match winning performance. 

Bailey finished the tournament, one in which they beat perennial powerhouse China 95-73, as New Zealand’s leading scorer and rebounder averaging 14.8 points and 6.2 boards per game. Those 14.8 points placed her sixth overall in scoring at the championships.

In finishing in the top four at the Asian Champs the New Zealand team have qualified for the FIBA U17 World Cup in Mexico in 2024.

Bailey was a member of the Harbour team that won the U15 Girl’s National Championships in 2022 and whilst we couldn’t retain the title this year the achievements of our two girl’s teams was still noteworthy.

The A girls went down in the semi-final against eventual champions Waikato and to Rotorua in the bronze medal game finishing 4th overall. Congratulations to Lisa Gear who was named to the Girl’s Tournament Team.

The B Girl’s had a tournament to remember. It’s outstanding for a B team to qualify top eight but to go on and finish fifth is exceptional. After a loss to Waikato in the quarters the girls had a thrilling 79-78 win over a strong Taranaki team and followed that with a victory over Canterbury's top side 66-54 for 5th place at the National Champs. 

This is the best performance ever by one of our B teams!

The Sal’s NBL Final 6 begins at Trusts Arena on Thursday where a number of Harbour athletes will be hoping their team can win the championship.

Auckland Tuatara, with their posse of Harbour athletes, carry the #1 seeding into the play-offs despite going down to Wellington Saints 102-93 in their final regular season game.

Rob Loe had his customary double-double (12 points and 11 rebounds) while Kruz Perrott-Hunt scored 13 points making three from four triples in the loss.

Also suffering defeat were the Franklin Bulls. In a 103-89 loss to the Canterbury Rams Dan Fotu was again a standout with a team high 22 points. Dan had impressive shooting stats making 8 from 9 from the field including 2 from 2 threes.

The Bulls will take on the Saints in a semi-final play-in game on Thursday whilst the other play-in game will feature Denhym Brooke and the Hawkes Bay Hawks who match up with the Rams.

The Final 6 is being played at Trusts Arena from Thursday to Sunday.

Before that we get to see the BNZ Northern Kāhu in action in their second Tauihi Basketball Aotearoa game of the season.

The Kāhu take on Mainland Pouākai at Franklin Pool and Leisure Centre on Wednesday night after suffering an 82-76 loss to Southern Hoiho on Saturday in Dunedin.

Coming off a strong campaign with the Tall Ferns last month Akiene-Tera Reed was outstanding in the defeat as she scored 27 points – a Tauihi best for Tera.