Nayland Under 15 Tasman representative girls basketballers Tavie Geddes, Cooper Phipps and Pene Taulafo played at the national tournament in Tauranga during the July school break.

The team, led by coach Kat Jones, made it to the quarter-finals and placed 7th in their grade out of 20 teams. This is the first time a Tasman team has made the top 8 for quite some time.

Player Tavie Geddes says she is pleased with the result. “I was happy because I wasn’t expecting to get to quarter finals, I was like maybe top 10? We ended up coming 7th out of 20 teams so that was good. I was expecting it to be much harder.”

Their Waikato opponents in the quarter final game went on to win the grade. However, the Tasman team put on a strong performance, especially at the beginning of the game. “It was close the first half and then they started smashing us,” Tavie said.