Over the recent October school holidays, Columba had 16 girls across four teams representing Otago in national hockey tournaments.

There were two Otago teams competing in the Under 15 national tournament, which was held here in Dunedin during the first week of the school holidays. 

The Otago A team included Hannah Cormack, Briar Duncan, Alisha Horne and Madison Lobb. The team had a fantastic tournament and finished in 10th place, which was the best result achieved in a number of years.

Otago was the only association to enter two teams (essentially ensuring there wasn’t a bye in our home competition).  The B team, who was only entered 2 weeks prior to the tournament starting, consisted of Grace Darling, Amelia Francis, Neve Graamans, Louisa Kotkamp and Phoebe O’Donnell.  The team had an awesome tournament competing well against all teams and even taking two well deserved wins against unsuspecting opposition to finish in 14th place.

The Otago Collier U13 team (Ciara Paterson, Charli Sinclair and Peyton Wafer) travelled to Wellington in the second week of the holidays for the national Collier tournament. They had a gruelling schedule with 7 games over a six day period, with some very close games earning a spot in the middle 8, and 16th overall at the end of the week.

Otago Collier Development travelled to Oamaru for the Festival of Hockey (Pip Eason, Molly McClure, Mia Webster and Rhiarna Webster) where they competed against other regions from around the South Island. This was a great experience for these girls and for most their first taste of representative hockey.

All Otago teams, and the Columba girls in particular, played some fantastic hockey over the course of the week providing for some great results. The number of Columba girls gaining great experience of the higher quality representative hockey bodes well for the future of hockey at Columba.