The Launceston Tornadoes knocked off the Hobart Chargers in their pre-season practice match at Launceston’s Elphin Stadium on Saturday to give new coach Ben Rush his first win with the team.
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The Torns triumphed 65-49 in a close game throughout that saw both teams experimenting with a lot of local talent before interstate imports arrive.
The Tornadoes were able to play former Chargers player Ellie Collins who is one of the club’s new recruits along with some of the young talent in Jayde Brazendale, Sarah O’Neill and Sophie Ackerly with Olivia Howard returning from an extended injury lay-off to be prominent in the win, top-scoring with 21 points.
Another up and coming local talent in 14-year-old Aishah Anis shot 10 points while for the Chargers another rising talent in 16-year-old state under-18 athlete Sharna Thompson scored 16 points with Kylie McCauley dropping 10.
The pre-season Senior Classic saw the McKinnon Cougars bring over senior men’s, women’s and under-23 teams to take on Tasmanian SEABL and state under-18 teams.
The Hobart Chargers men’s team had a good win defeating the visiting Victorian McKinnon Cougars senior men’s team 75-64.
The Chargers were behind at quarter time 27-9 but pegged McKinnon back to triumph in a high-class contest.
Tiri Masunda shot 11 points for the Chargers and Dwayne Radcliffe 10 with Dylan Stith shooting 17 for McKinnon and Ivan Platenik 15.
The McKinnon senior women held on to defeat the Chargers’ women 67-64 in a thriller. McKinnon started with a 16-0 run before the Chargers fought their way back into the game to level the scores in the last quarter before going down by three.
Kathleen Scheer top scored for the Chargers with 17 points in her first game since arriving back in the state and Isabelle Morgan shot 13.
The state under-18 girls’ defeated the Launceston under-23s, 67-27, and the McKinnon Cougars also defeated Launceston 76-57.
The state under-18 girls’ team played well to defeat the McKinnon team 82-52 with some great shooting and the state 18 boys’ defeated the Launceston under-23 men, 100-69.
“We are having a busy weekend at Elphin which is great from a basketball point of view,” Basketball Tasmania chief executive Chris McCoy said.
“As well as the senior and under-23 games between our Tasmanian teams and the visiting McKinnon teams we had an under-12 future development camp with 120 of our best nine, ten and 11-year-old boys and girls from across the state come together for the camp in a busy day.”