Mangaung returned to winning ways on the third day of the SPAR National Netball Championships at Hoërskool Rustenburg on Wednesday.
In their morning match, they beat Nelson Mandela Bay 58-43 after leading 25-16 at halftime.
But their afternoon match was a nailbiter. They trailed Tshwane, last year’s runners up, for most of the match, but snatched a one goal victory in the dying moments.
At halftime, Tshwane were nine goals ahead (33-24) but the team from the Free State reduced the deficit to four in the third quarter (41-37) and then won the match by 54 goals to 53.
Johannesburg & Mangaung top the log on Day 3 of the SPAR National Netball Championships. Mangaung beat Nelson Mandela Bay 58-43 in the morning and came out on top 54-53 in a nailbiter against Tshwane.
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“We drew on the experience of out draw against Johannesburg yesterday, when we had it in the bag but let them draw level,” said coach Martha Mosoahle-Samm.
“I am so proud of the team, and I always knew that if we could get to within four goals, we could win,” she said.
Tshwane coach Rozanne Matthyse tried to put a brave face on things.
“We shouldn’t have lost that match – we were 10 goals up at one stage and we lost by one goal.
“Under pressure, players need to dig deep and to draw energy from one another, but this didn’t happen. We will go back and look at the game again and see what we did wrong, but I can still take positives out of this match.”
Earlier, Tshwane beat Cape Town 64-45, after leading 33-24 at halftime.
Johannesburg continued their march to the semifinals with victories over log leaders Dr Kenneth Kaunda and Cape Winelands.
Playing in intense heat, with the thermometre touching 36 degrees Celsius, Dr Kenneth Kaunda appeared to be gaining ground on Johannesburg and were just two goals behind at halftime (27-25) but Johannesburg came back strongly in the third quarter, scoring 13 goals while restricting Dr Kenneth Kaunda to just four.
Dr Kenneth Kaunda had a better final quarter but Johannesburg clinched the victory 52-39.
In their late afternoon match, Johannesburg beat Cape Winelands 61-46.
In other matches on Wednesday, Cape Winelands beat Buffalo City 75-30 and Nelson Mandela Bay beat Cape Town 47-46, after trailing 22-25 at halftime.
Mangaung, Johannesburg and Dr Kenneth Kaunda appear set for the semifinals, with Tshwane and Cape Winelands fighting it out for the fourth spot.
A feature of this tournament has been the close contests between the top five teams, in the absence of the SPAR national squad, who are preparing for a tour of Australia later this month.