Tara Murray
Keilor Thunder produced its best performance of the National Basketball League 1 women’s South to win through to the grand final.
In just its third season in the competition, the Thunder has the chance to claim its first title.
Thunder coach Kristi Harrower said she was so proud of the playing group and everything they have fought through this season.
“It was our best game of the season and hopefully we can repeat it next week,” she said.
“We’ve had so much adversity this season with Tera [Reed] having missed a number of weeks, and [Maddy] Rocci in and out with the Opals program and we’ve had to handle that.
“Grace [Graham] has stepped away from the set up for her own reasons.
“They are such a quality group. We focused on bringing in good people first and good players second.”
On Saturday night, the Thunder hosted the Ballarat Miners in a preliminary final.
The one they had met, the Miners won by 18 points before the win was stripped due to playing an ineligible player.
Reed and Rocci didn’t play for the Thunder on that occasion.
It was an even first quarter before the Thunder managed to open up a five point lead heading into the main break.
After half time, the Thunder took control of the game. The Miners wouldn’t go away, with the Thunder only locking up the 96-75 win in the dying minutes.
“To keep them to 75 points it was really pleasing,” Harrower said. “To score 96 was even more pleasing.
“It was a real team game and everybody who was out there for us played their role.”
Harrower said the match had a real WNBL feel to it, with so many high quality players on the court.
She said defensively they did an outstanding job to shut down some of their shooters, including Jaz Shelley
Offensively, all five starters scored double figures led by Isabelle Bourne with 24.
Harrower said having a spread of scorers was really important.
“We want everyone to be able to score and the confidence to do it as a real team effort,” she said.
“It’s a nice thing and we become hard to guard when everyone is stepping up for us.”
Harrower said she thought Reed played her best game for the season.
The Thunder now face the Mt Waverley Falcons at 4pm on Saturday in the grand final at Dandenong.
Harrower said it was disappointing that they didn’t get to host the grand final being the highest ranked team left.
She said they’re hoping to get a big crowd of Thunder supporters to make the trip over.
“The crowd has been great the last two weeks with finals at home,” she said. “Hopefully they’ll travel down the highway.”
Harrower said they were hoping this would be the start of something big for the club.
She said they would strip their training back a bit this week and focus on the game plan and freshen their players up.
Harrower said they were hoping that the Big V youth league women’s fixture would allow their youth girls to be part of it too.
“They bring the energy,” Harrower said. “Hopefully they’ll be here as they have been part of it all year.
“It would be a great experience for them.”
