The Mystics were lucky to have their nimble-fingered playmaker for their ANZ Premiership grand final win over the Tactix, Suzanne McFadden reports
It was hard not to notice the hero of the Mystics’ national league grand final victory, Peta Toeava, playing with a bandaged left hand.
Toeava has been one of the outstanding players of this season’s ANZ Premiership, with her magical passing game, especially her blinding feeds to the Mystics’ teenage shooting sensation, Grace Nweke.
But for a while, it was touch and go whether Toeava would take the court, after badly spraining her hand at training the week before the final.
“You have players who get injured and let you know they can’t do what they normally do,” said Mystics head coach Helene Wilson after the game. “Or you have players who tell you as a coach, ‘I’ll give you what I can for as long as I can’.”
Toeava is the latter.
“Once you assess the risk, and you get the doctor’s approval that there’s no possible further risk to the player, if they’re prepared to go out there and play, then you’ve got to let them play,” Wilson continued.
“I didn’t know how long I would get out of Peta tonight. But the fact that she played almost the entire game is testament to how much she wanted to be in this game.”
How could she not? This game was historic. It had been a decade since the Mystics franchise had made a national league final, and in the 23 years of elite netball competition – stretching back to the start of the Coca Cola Cup - an Auckland team had never won a title.
That was until Sunday afternoon, in front of a crowd of almost 5000 at Spark Arena, when the Mystics held off the Tactix, 61-59, in a tense, swift and spirited match befitting a grand final. When wing attack Toeava was voted the game's most valuable player.
Bailey Mes, the longest-serving of the Mystics players who formed critical links with Toeava, called her “my hero”.
“I think she probably doesn’t realise how special she is. And what she does for our team, not just on court. She lights the spark in us,” Mes said. “She really sees what everyone is capable of and the valuable they bring. I’m so proud of her.”
But the premiership wasn’t won by Toeava alone. That was made obvious early in the fourth quarter, when the Mystics were up by four, and she left the court in pain.
Claire O’Brien replaced her, and for those four-and-a-half minutes, the Mystics attack didn’t miss a beat. That was undoubtedly one of the Mystics’ strengths this season, said Mes, the highly experienced Silver Ferns shooter injected into the game at the start of the second quarter for impressive young goal attack Filda Vui.
“We knew anyone could come on at any time and it would be seamless. And we knew, from all the games over the season, if we just did our jobs, we would all be fine,” Mes said.
In fact, Mystics captain Sulu Fitzpatrick said she knew “we were going to be fine” in the last two minutes of the match, “when I saw Peta smile”.
The trophy meant so much for Mes in a tough year. She made her elite netball debut with the Mystics in 2010 and played most of her more than 100 national league games for them.
“It’s almost like relief, after so much hard work,” she said, fighting back tears. “It’s probably been my hardest season, coming back from injury. I didn’t think it would be that hard.” Mes returned after more than a year off the court following surgery for a knee injury.
She shot just one goal in the grand final, but it was the work she did into and around Nweke – who shot a massive 58 from 62 – that played a part in the Mystics’ victory.
Nweke, who’s still only 19, has gone from strength to strength during the season and is now comfortable being the targeted shooter.
While the outstanding Tactix defence of Jane Watson and Karin Burger stole some ball destined for the 1.93m tall Nweke, captain Watson admitted they may have to work on a new strategy to deny her possession next season.
“It’s a challenge. They’ve done some really good work, they can feed her very well. She’s got the height over most people in the competition,” she said.
It wouldn’t be surprising to see Nweke and Toeava, who’ve developed an almost instinctive understanding, included in the Silver Ferns squad named this week.
Burger’s exceptional season for the Tactix has rivalled the impact of Toeava’s, and she made two intercepts near the end of the first quarter that reminded the Mystics home crowd, and kept the visitors in touch, down 17-14.
Like Nweke, Tactix rangy goal shoot Ellie Bird was shooting with perfect accuracy and the first three goals after the break saw the Tactix draw even.
The Mystics would make small surges, with Fitzpatrick and Kate Burley lethal on defence, and they led 33-28 at halftime. Fitzpatrick constantly urged her team to “be brave”.
But in the third quarter, it was the Tactix who reduced a deficit of seven to two. It was a gap, though, they just couldn’t bridge for the rest of the game.
The Tactix, who ground back from a losing streak at the start of their season, are now the bridesmaids for two seasons running. Coach Marianne Delaney-Hoshek’s first response: “Bummer.”
“But I couldn’t be more proud of the way we kept fighting right till the end. I sort of feel like if there was another two minutes we may have come through,” she said.
But it was always going to be tough overthrowing a Mystics side who’d dominated the last half of the season, and developed the right combination of players under the coaching guidance of Aucklander Wilson and Australian Rob Wright.
Fitzpatrick dedicated the Mystics’ victory to former Silver Fern Margaret Forsyth, who died in May. Forsyth was an assistant coach to the Mystics last season, and Fitzpatrick carried around photos of her after the game.
“She’s with us in heaven, in spirit, and we know she’s been with us all season. She means a lot to us, and we hope we made her proud,” she said. “The values she lived by, the kind of person she was… that’s the type of person we want to aspire to as women. Not just in netball, but off the court as well.”
