The Harden Hawkettes are the 2022 Blumers Lawyers George Tooke Shield Premiers after they accounted for the Boorowa Roverettes, 28-2 at Bungendore on Saturday.
The Hawkettes hit the field after the success of the WorHawks, who won the previous game and with a large crowd in attendance, took on their closest rival this year. Both sides went at each other for the first 15 minutes before Harden conceded a penalty.
Boorowa took the goal option and went up by 2 points meaning that Harden had only conceded 14 points for the entire year.
This allowed the maroon and whites the chance to get back down the other end of the field and they did so where they applied plenty of pressure.
Harden scored their first try through Georgia Smith and it was converted by Emma James.
They hit the half time break in a 6-2 position.
Coach Pollard knew that the girls weren’t hitting their straps to the full potential and that they needed to get into the game and throw more at the Boorowa defence.
He said, “We weren’t playing particularly well, we made a few errors, nothing much went our way, we spoke about energy and running into holes and it worked in the second half.”
Harden hit back with tries to Courtney Barrett, Clare Smith and another to Georgia before Mary Lou Minehan put the icing on the cake with a try just on full time.
Emma James was great with the boots and kicked 4 from 5 for the day. Coach Jason Pollard said, “They have always played well when they go in numbers and they started to do that on Saturday.
We introduced a few new moves towards the end of the year and they got those down.”
The Hawkettes will be looking to reform for 2023 with 3 players stuck on 99 games due to a washout late in the season.
Kate Menz and Clare and Grace Smith will be hoping to play their 100th game next year.
Coach Pollard is hoping to get them back for their milestones and another good year.
He said, “Some travel from Tumut or Wollongong and Canberra, they are all just really good mates which helps.”
The Hawkettes undefeated season saw them score 685 points with an average of 45.7 points scored per game, which is up on last year’s astonishing 490 and an average of 44.5.
Along with their crushing offence, the Hawkettes defence is another strength that makes them the undisputed champs.
They only allowed 14 points all season in their 15 games, which is a similar overpowering effort from last season where they held their opponents to 10 in 11 games.
Adding to their team success has been the race between Emma James, Clare Smith and Georgia Smith for the competition’s leading try and points scorer.
Clare put in a great effort with her colossal 31 tries for the season, but Georgia couldn’t let her crown from last year go, so she had an amazing season with 42 tries.
While the champions of try scoring are Clare and Georgia, Emma James takes home the top points scorer crown for the competition.
Clare Smith came in third place with 124 points, Georgia Smith came in second place with 168 points, Emma James topped them all with 187 points. Leading Emma to reach this tremendous score is her 71 percent conversion rate on 130 attempts.
The Hawkettes will be heading off to a few knockout tournaments in early 2023.
Congratulations to the WorHawks and the Hawkettes for 2022.
