Hatters and UWIC set up final clash
13th December 2011
The away teams were victorious in the Women's National Cup semi-finals as Sheffield and UWIC set up a clash in the final at Ponds Forge in Sheffield on January 29.
Hatters made the short trip to Nottingham to face Karen Burton's Wildcats and made short work of their opponents as they took the opening quarter 29-8. The remainder of the game was much more competetive, but the home team were unable to threaten overturning the deficit and Hatters eventually ran out 87-50 winners.
Stephanie Gandy and Helen Naylor both scored 20 points for Sheffield as they secured their twenty-first cup final spot in the last 23 years. No-one scored more than Caitlin Flood's 12 for Nottingham.
Archers were on the road at Sevenoaks in their semi-final and the first half was hard fought with UWIC leading 46-35 at the break. A dominant third quarter, which UWIC won 29-15, ended the game as a contest and saw Archers into their second ever cup final.
Great Britain international Rose Anderson led UWIC with 25 points and Kate Butters added 21. Rosalee Mason led Sevenoaks with 22 points.
UWIC coach Damian Jennings was understandably happy with his club's end to 2011: "It is great as a club to be in a final. Going into the festive break knowing we can prepare for silverware keeps you hungry and wanting to make the sacrifices in order to achieve. We know that everyone is preparing to play their best against us and that will be no different when we face Sheffield in the Cup final."
Sevenoaks coach Len Busch was philosophical about the loss: "This was probably our first real poor performance of the year. We got into serious foul trouble in the first quarter and survived that to only trail by 6 early in the third quarter, then we had a series of defensive and offensive breakdowns that resulted in a 20-2 UWIC run. UWIC is a very good team and they capitalized on most of our mistakes. The experience, as painful as it was, will make us better as we now know some areas that we need to improve on."