Stacey Siu Butt proved she still had what it takes to com­pete with the best when she reg­is­tered a hat-trick to lead Shandy Carib Mag­no­lias past ri­vals Ven­tures 6-4 in a feisty fi­nal-round, round-robin en­counter in the T&T Hock­ey Board In­door Cham­pi­onship Women's Open Di­vi­sion at the Wood­brook Youth Fa­cil­i­ty, Hamil­ton Hold­er Street, Wood­brook, on Tues­day night.

Ven­tures took a sixth-minute lead via for­mer na­tion­al cap­tain Cristi­na Abreu but two min­utes lat­er Siu Butt got Mag­no­lias even, on­ly for Abreu to re­store her team's slim lead four min­utes lat­er at 2-1. Na­tion­al for­ward Yese­nia Luces added a third with­in sec­onds as Ven­tures took con­trol of the match.

How­ev­er, na­tion­al youth team for­ward Bri­an­na Govia and for­mer na­tion­al play­er Mi­ka El­la Tang, then net­ted in the 15th and 16th min­utes re­spec­tive­ly for Mag­no­lias to pull lev­el at 3-3 at the half-time in­ter­val.

On re­sump­tion, both teams con­tin­ued their re­lent­less all-out at­tack with Siu Butt fir­ing in Mag­no­lias' fourth item in the 25th minute for its first lead at 4-3 while club­mate Elise Olton scored in the 32nd for a 5-3 ad­van­tage to turn the match on its head.

Two min­utes lat­er Abreu com­plet­ed her hat-trick to pull Ven­tures with­in one of its ri­val at 5-4 but with the sec­onds tick­ing away, Siu Butt then got her own hat-trick with a 40th minute strike to seal an en­ter­tain­ing 6-4 tri­umph.

The win se­cured Mag­no­lias' top spot with 13 points from five match­es af­ter it was al­so award­ed a 5-0 de­fault win over De­fence Force for a match not played. In to­day's semi­fi­nal Mag­no­lias will face fourth-placed fin­ish­ers Mar­itime Har­vard Check­ers from 9 pm.

Pri­or to the Mag­no­lias/Ven­tures en­counter, Check­ers made cer­tain a new cham­pi­on will be crowned when it oust­ed last year's win­ner Notre Dame 1-0 with speedy na­tion­al for­ward Brit­tney Hingh the scor­er in the 12th minute.

The Dames, who were with­out key play­er Blair Wynne due to an in­jury, cre­at­ed a num­ber of chances in the match, but need­ing to win by a two goal mar­gin, they failed to net. In the oth­er women's semi­fi­nal sched­uled for to­mor­row, Paragon, which end­ed sec­ond with ten points, comes up against Ven­tures.

The men's open semi­fi­nal will al­so serve off tonight with the round-robin win­ners meet­ing the fourth-placed team while the sec­ond and third teams bat­tle to­mor­row for places in Sun­day's fi­nal.

How­ev­er, the top four teams are yet to be de­ter­mined with on­ly Queen's Park (15 points), Petrotrin (13) and De­fence Force (10) cer­tain of qual­i­fi­ca­tion while Malvern and Paragon, both with sev­en points still in last.

Last night, De­fence Force faced Malvern and Petrotrin bat­tled Paragon with the Parkites hav­ing al­ready played its six match­es. The Un­der-21 men and women and the mixed vet­er­ans semi­fi­nals will al­so serve off tonight with one match each, with the oth­er half set for to­mor­row.

In the vet­er­ans, Carib ce­ment­ed its semi­fi­nal ap­pear­ance with a 2-2 draw with Petrotrin to end its six-match cam­paign with 11 points, four be­hind ta­ble-top­per Queen's Park while Malvern end­ed sec­ond with 12. Last night, Notre Dame and Petrotrin, both with sev­en points were in the hunt for the fi­nal spot in match­es against Po­lice and Queen's Park re­spec­tive­ly.

Stand­ings

Men

Teams P W D L F A Pts

QPCC 6 5 0 1 36 20 15

Petrotrin 5 4 1 0 24 14 13

D/Force 5 3 1 1 21 13 10

Paragon 5 2 1 2 18 14 7

Malvern 5 2 0 3 18 20 6

Notre Dame 6 1 1 4 15 25 4

Fa­ti­ma 6 0 0 6 12 39 0

Women

Mag­no­lias 5 4 1 0 29 12 13

Paragon 5 3 1 1 22 11 10

Ven­tures 5 3 0 2 19 14 9

Check­ers 5 3 0 2 14 12 9

Notre Dame 5 1 0 4 16 20 3

D Force 5 0 0 5 3 34 0

Mixed Vet­er­ans

QPCC 5 5 0 0 30 11 15

Malvern 6 4 0 2 20 12 12

Carib 6 3 2 1 17 12 11

Notre Dame 5 2 1 2 25 9 7

Petrotrin 5 2 1 2 14 28 7

Fa­ti­ma 6 1 0 5 11 31 3

Po­lice 5 0 0 5 2 19 0

RE­SULTS

Tues­day

Women's Open

Check­ers 1 (Brit­tney Hingh 12th) vs Notre Dame 0

Mag­no­lias 6 (Stacey Siu Butt 8th, 25th, 40th, Bri­an­na Govia 15th, Mi­ka El­la Tang 16th, Elise Olton 32nd) vs Ven­tures 4 (Cristi­na Abreu 6th, 10th, 33rd, Yese­nia Luces 10th)

Mixed Vet­er­ans

Carib 2 (Kevin Adams 6th, An­dre Du­rant 7th) vs Petrotrin 2 (Sher­bert Mc Kie 8th, Bertrand Dun­can 18th)

Fa­ti­ma 3 (Mark Nieves 15th, 25th, Sean Nieves 30th) vs Po­lice 2 (James Beck­les 20th, Suzette Pierre 30th)

TO­DAY'S MATCH­ES

Semi­fi­nals

Un­der-21 Women: Mag­no­lias vs Check­ers, 6 pm

Un­der-21 Men: QPCC vs Notre Dame, 7 pm

Mixed Vet­er­ans: QPCC vs Notre Dame, 8 pm

Women's Open: Mag­no­lias vs Check­ers, 9 pm

Men's Open: Round-robin win­ner vs Round-robin fourth spot