The start to the 2020 Super Netball season was meant to be all about the controversial super shot, such was the hype and excitement surrounding its introduction. But heading into the fourth round of this condensed, Covid-compromised season, the league’s sizzle reel is instead resplendent with some other distinctive dexterities which have made the game unique for decades.
From Swift Sophie Garbin’s game-changing, off-the-bench performance against the West Coast Fever, which saw her shoot a record-equalling 21 “ones” in a single quarter, to Firebird Kim Jenner’s five eye-popping intercepts against the Pies or flawless triangle play from the Vixens’ attack end to make purists weep, recent rounds have shown it is not just bombs that light up the court.
Across rounds two and three, compressed into five days, there was a match won by a side which did not score a single super shot – the Sunshine Coast Lightning in an impressive four-goal victory over Collingwood – and another, between the Pies and Firebirds, which saw just seven supers in the allotted 20 minutes.
The total number of successful supers from the new 1.9m arc has been steadily dropping since round one too, from 72 to 48 to 41. The accuracy is falling too, from 63% in round one to 48% in three.
Is that the razzle dazzle anticipated by league bosses when they introduced the divisive rule weeks out from the season start? Or is the hope for a game to be won from downtown on the buzzer, as in basketball? That has not happened yet, either.
One player who is less show and more business and potentially a victim of the new rule due to her penchant for shooting close to the post is Diamonds captain Caitlin Bassett. She has been under the microscope since the season began.
But after riding the bench for 18 and 29 minutes respectively in her team’s back-to-back losses to the Swifts and Thunderbirds, she played every minute of her 200th national league game on Tuesday afternoon, guiding her Giants to an empathic 75-68 win over the Fever, their first of the season.
In vintage no-fuss fashion, the 193cm spearhead put in 47/53 at 89% accuracy, demanding the ball and positioning with relative ease on a revolving door of West Coast keepers trying to cover the absence of injured star Courtney Bruce. She did turn the ball over twice, a sin for any shooter and something she is often criticised for, but that statistic was well down on the four and six in previous rounds.
Bassett was ably assisted, some might say honoured even, by her goal circle partner and game MVP Jo Harten, who has been vocal in her criticism of the super shot, including during a live interview during round one.
From the first whistle, the England international looked determined to play a big role in getting Bassett a win in her milestone match. She finished with 22/25 (including 6/7 supers) at 88% accuracy, but vitally also had 22 feeds and took two intercepts and two rebounds.
It will be intriguing to see if Giants coach Julie Fitzgerald gives Bassett the same minutes against the winless Firebirds on Saturday, given the defensive pairing of Jenner – who nearly single-handedly changed the result in her side’s four-goal loss to the Pies with her clutch intercepts – and Tara Hinchliffe are one of the league’s best.
What happens in the Magpies’ clash with the Fever this round may be instructive for the rest of the season too. Pundits have noted that while goal attack Gabby Sinclair is able to score from the arc, she lacks the Nat Medhurst-esque play-making skills that youngster Nyah Allen, who has already proved she can shoot from distance, seemingly brings to the game.
Does coach Rob Wright persist with Sinclair, who shot 6/7 supers on Tuesday, or look to give 18-year-old Allen more time?
In the 2019 grand final rematch on Sunday, the Lightning, thoroughly embarrassed by a clinical Vixens by 12 goals in Kate Moloney’s 100th national league match, will have to find fresh ways to score against the classy, unbeaten Swifts, as Diamond Steph Wood continues to struggle with a niggling knee injury.
In an uncharacteristically bad game, Wood finished with 11/17 at 65% against the Vixens, who sit atop the ladder unbeaten, as early premiership favourites.
Simone McKinnis’s charges should account for the Thunderbirds on Sunday, even though Adelaide boast two of the most accurate super shooters in Sasha Glasgow (7/10 in round three) and Samantha Gooden (9/10 in round one).
The Victorians, the best attacking team in the league with 204 goals and the second-best defensively after the Lightning, seem to have found a sweet spot in 2020, thanks to their combination of holding and moving shooters, disciplined defence and pure grunt through the middle.
Perceived as conservative and conventional by most, the Vixens might be well placed to dominate in this most unconventional of seasons.
