The Women’s and Men’s annual South Island Interprovincial tournaments were held over the 28-29 October weekend at Rangiora Golf Club and Otago Golf Club respectively.
Rangiora Golf Club played host to the women’s SI showpiece Rep event this year where they welcomed just three provinces this year in Otago, Aorangi, and Canterbury with the event being played over 36 holes. In the split team match play format all teams took on 4 opponents of the other provinces in the morning and the other 4 in the afternoon meaning the final result remained in the balance until the conclusion of round 2.
Canterbury started slowly in round 1 being behind in most matches before eventually fighting back to be 2-2 vs Otago but 2.5-1.5 down in their match against Aorangi. Vanessa Lim recorded a solid 6/5 victory over Otago’s Tracey Storer and Alisia Ren winning 4/2 over Aorangi’s Ginny Bolderston.
In the afternoon there were many more Canterbury victories taking out all 4 matches against Otago components, notable performances included wins for Rangiora local players Sora Kishida at number 1 defeating Yoonae Jeong 4/2 and Mikana Suto’s 4/3 victory over Abby Crawford. The Final margin finished at 6-2 for Canterbury over Otago. In the Aorangi matches Canterbury did just enough prevailing 4.5-3.5 with Aroha Minhinnick defeating Deanna Mathews 5/4 and Olive Tapu defeating Jennifer Sheppard 3/2. The two team wins proved enough to reclaim the title for the Cantabs.
Full results - HERE.
The men’s event this year was held in Dunedin at the historic Otago Golf Club. Canterbury went down as defending champions but knowing hosts Otago would be hard beats on their home track. Played again in the split format results remained in the balance throughout the event played over 72 holes across the Saturday and Sunday.
On day 1 Canterbury was up against Aorangi and Tasman, both sides with some new faces in their line up’s. Canterbury too had several players on debut at this level in Seb May, Tom Lee and Tim Leonard, the latter two players however boasting years of representative experience. The Aorangi match was a relatively straightforward affair with Canterbury prevailing 7-1. Tom Lee and Cooper Moore each winning by a margin of 6/5 and Tim Leonard winning 6/4. The Tasman match up however was a close contest with Canterbury narrowly prevailing 5-3. Peter Lee getting a big win 7/6 at number 8 with captain Reid Hilton and Cooper Moore winning 3/2. A big result came from Seb May who got over the line 1Up vs David Eglestaff.
Onto Day 2 with all in the balance as we faced the southern provinces Southland and Otago, the latter also recording two wins on day 1. In the Southland contest, Canterbury won out 5.5-2.5, Sam McGill recording a 3/1 victory with Leonard winning 5/4 and Moore 4/2. The Otago match however was a very tough affair with Otago winning 5-5-2.5. Dominic Brettkelly managed a 1Up victory at the number 2 spot with Peter Lee also winning 3/1 and Tim Leonard halfing. That result was enough for Otago to reclaim the title with 4 teams wins versus Canterbury’s 3 wins.
Full results can be viewed - HERE.
Both teams now moved onto the NZ Interprovincial with those teams set to be named very soon.
