What a week last week was - Waimate High School sent 42 students to Christchurch to compete in the Koru Games. They played Rugby, Netball, 3 v 3 Basketball, Hockey and Squash.

We had a great few days away with 42 students across 5 different sports in 3 different locations. The students played hard in each of their respective sports and came away with some awesome results. This was our first time attending these games after them being cancelled last year. In some of our down time the kids enjoyed a game of Minigolf and visited the Margaret Mahy Playground and enjoyed all the outdoor games and bounce pillow where we were staying. A massive thank you to the amazing coaches that came away with us to help out. Thank you - Chris Chave, Tim Caird, John Thomas, Nicola Guy!

SQUASH

Alex and Tyler had a great time representing Waimate High School at the 2022 Koru Games. Both are keen squash players and took on the challenge of unknown opponents in the pool rounds with a positive attitude. Tyler played a lot of tough matches and had some great wins which saw him finish 4th at the end of pool play, while Alex battled hard to go through to the top of the table. Semi finals saw the two friends have to face off, Alex being the victor. Tyler went on to another very close match, just missing out on the bronze medal. 

Alex pulled out all the shots to win the final match in straight sets and claim the gold medal. 

3 v 3 BASKETBALL:

We had a boys and a girls 3v3 team entered in the Koru Games.  

Our Girls team Sally Cooney, Milla McKenzie, Zaylee Davis, Isabella Sleigh and Rachael Hodder played 15 games over the 3 days. They played teams from all round the South Island such as Westland, Clearview, Middleton, Darfield and Kaiapoi North. 

The girls played as a real wee team, gelling nicely together.  They won 11 of their games. They played the final for first and second against Kaiapoi North School.  They fought really hard coming away in second place with the silver medal.

Our boys team Hunter Briggs, Cody Swatridge, Jackson Couper, Callum Rempala and Ash Osborne played 13 games over the 3 days. They also played teams from all over the South Island such as Middleton, Lemonwood, Prebbleton, Springston and Cashmere.  

The boys played really well together.  All growing as players over the 3 days. They played their final for 17th and 18th place winning 10-5 to come in 17th.

HOCKEY

Our team was Ashley Guy, Penny Smith, Connor Dee, Mackenzie Mehrtens, Hamish Tiffen, Molly Smith, Lachlan Matthews and Emma Ottley.
The weather most certainly wasn't winter hockey weather, and by the end of each day the kids were exhausted. Ashley and Lachlan even managed to do some umpiring whilst we were away, which was also great to see them step up and happily forfeit some game time to do so. 

Each and every member of this team contributed and nothing was ever a problem, and when we had to play Ao Tawhiti again, we mixed up the teams, and the 3 that we gave to them really helped them out and set them up for some goals, which was an absolute delight to see! 

I thoroughly enjoyed my time away coaching these students, and look forward to seeing hockey thrive going forward.

- Nicola Guy

NETBALL

The netball team had an awesome 3 days and started with all wins on the first day. Day two the tournament experience started to kick in and the girls learnt how tough it is to play lots of games back to back. Day three they found their groove again with plenty of wins. Netball was the largest sport at the whole games with 32 teams entered and the girls finished 17th after a couple of unlucky results and felt good after beating the team that finished 5th on day one buy 5 goals. 

RUGBY

The year 7/8 rugby sevens team had a great tournament at the Lincoln rugby grounds. Our team was Ruby McGillen, Ben Chave, Kingston Gibson, Harlan McHardy, Eli Taupo, Lucas Farrell, Callum Carter, Sam Hay, Pat Huwes, Cameron Lane, Lachie Patterson, and Santi Zimmermann. 

Over the first day and a half they won 3 out of 4 games to head through to the top 6 play off.

The play offs proved to be challenging but the boys held together and played with great team spirit to finish 6th overall.

A great time was had socialising with other schools including friendly lunchtime games with mixed school teams, a great way to show our school spirit. A big thank you to Tim Caird who coached the team leading up to the games and sharing his sevens experience.

- Megan Chave