Nigel Si­mon

Goal­shoot Daystar Swift end­ed off just as she start­ed the sea­son with a match win­ning per­for­mance to lead UTT to a con­vinc­ing 41-27 thrash­ing of Po­lice and with it a suc­cess­ful de­fence of their Pre­mier­ship Di­vi­sion crown in the Courts All Sec­tors Net­ball League at the East­ern Re­gion­al In­door Sports Are­na, Tacarigua on Sat­ur­day night.

Go­ing in­to the fi­nal match in the di­vi­sion, UTT, com­ing off a loss to Fire Ser­vice, its first of the sea­son need­ed a win or a draw to be cer­tain of the ti­tle af­ter the Fire­women pound­ed a hap­less De­fence Force 51-14 in the ear­li­er en­counter to draw lev­el at the top of the ta­ble with eight points each.

How­ev­er, from ear­ly on it was ev­i­dent UTT meant busi­ness with Swift and goalat­tack Jil­lisa Al­lan at the helm of its of­fense, but at the oth­er end, Gur­sh­er Grant and na­tion­al play­er Joelisa Coop­er was al­so en­joy­ing a good start as both teams end­ed the first pe­ri­od locked at 9-9.

The sec­ond quar­ter was al­so a close con­test with UTT sneak­ing ahead 17-16 be­fore pulling away in the third quar­ter 27-20 af­ter which it nev­er looked back.

In the end, Swift tal­lied 31 goals from 39 at­tempts while Al­lan added ten from 19 at­tempts to re­pel Coop­er's 12 from 19, Grant with ten from 14 and Kali­fa Mc Collin's, five from ten at­tempts. With the vic­to­ry, UTT end­ed with ten points and joined its Al­ter­na­tive Di­vi­sion team-mates and League cham­pi­ons.

Mean­while, Bermudez stayed on course to be crowned new Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion win­ners af­ter hold­ing of Jabloteh 39-33 to push its points tal­ly to 14 from eight match­es, and two to play.

Po­lice al­so kept its ti­tle as­pi­ra­tions alive when it bat­tled past Fire Ser­vice 44-41 to join its op­po­nents in sec­ond spot with 11 points. Fire Ser­vice on­ly has one match left to play to com­plete its ten-game sched­ule while Po­lice has two, the same as Bermudez which its meets tonight from 7 pm in a vir­tu­al ti­tle de­cider.

A win or draw for Bermudez will se­cure the league while a loss will keep Po­lice in the mix ahead of the fi­nal round of match­es.

In the fi­nal round, Bermudez meets UWI and Po­lice tack­les De­fence Force.

Re­sults

Cham­pi­onship Di­vi­sion

Bermudez 39 (Kathy James 22/32, Joyce­lyn Mar­celle 17/34) vs Jabloteh 33 (De­bra Bain 23/25, De­bra Beck­les 7/15, Saman­tha James 2/6, Lil­ia Cameron 1/4)

Quar­ter scores: 1st: Bermudez 9-4; 2nd: Bermudez 17-8: 3rd: Bermudez: 27-21

Po­lice 44 (Patrice Gor­ing 37/44, Jenice Mc In­tosh 7/12) vs Fire Ser­vice 41 (Aquila Blugh 22/34, Nari­ba Grant 19/38)

Quar­ter scores: 1st: Po­lice 14-11; 2nd: Po­lice 23-16; 3rd: Po­lice 34-27.

UWI 29 (Abeni Tay­lor 15/23, Akeela Ro­driguez 11/18, Roan­n­ta Dal­rym­ple 3/4) vs De­fence Force 21 (Melis­sa Snag­gs-James 14/24, Cheryl-Ann Milling­ton 7/15)

Quar­ter scores: 1st: UWI 6-4; 2nd: De­fence Force 13-12; 3rd: UWI 27-17.

Pre­mier­ship Di­vi­sion

Fire Ser­vice 51 (Afeisha Noel 35/50, Si­mone Mor­gan 16/28) vs De­fence Force 14 (Kar­lene Sylvester 8/21, Anas­tas­cia William 6/12)

Quar­ter scores: 1st: Fire Ser­vice 19-3; 2nd: Fire Ser­vice 29-9; 3rd: Fire Ser­vice 43-11.

UTT 41 (Daystar Swift 31/39, Jil­lisa Al­lan 10/19) vs Po­lice 27 (Joelisa Coop­er 12/19, Gur­sh­er Grant 10/14, Kali­fa Mc Collin 5/10)

Quar­ter scores: 1st 9-9; 2nd: UTT 17-16; 3rd: UTT 29-20.