Natte Bealiba played spoilers for the first final of the Maryborough Giants’ short history, securing a four-goal victory and a place in the preliminary final with it.
The Swans did all the damage in the second and third terms after a spirited start from both teams, and had to deal with a late Giants fightback in the last quarter as they continued to ask questions of the Swans.
In the end, however, it was the same margin as the two teams’ earlier clash this season, with the Swans also taking a four-goal victory in their round nine meeting.
The Swans will now meet the winner of Carisbrook or Lexton in their preliminary final, but will have to do so without the influential Naomi Medlyn, who ruptured her Achilles in an enormous blow.
Full quarter-by-quarter scores and goalscorers were unavailable by print deadline.
Swans’ coach Emma Ryan said she was thrilled to get the win, hailing the team’s defensive pressure.
“We had ourselves set up and were up by about 10 or 11 goals. Unfortunately, we kind of let them back in a little bit in the last quarter, but a win is a win, and we’ll take it,” she said.
“We speak about our full-court defensive pressure a lot — not just our three defenders, but everyone. We spend a lot of time working on that, and it comes out in a really positive sense, because we can restrict teams to low scores, and we are able to turn the ball over a lot of times in our attacking end before it goes to the other side of the court too. It’s definitely something we pride ourselves on as well.
The defensive structure will be one to watch over the next two weeks as Ryan plots a path to replace the irreplaceable Medlyn.
“Unfortunately, Naomi Medlyn ruptured her Achilles, which is a big spanner in the works for us. It was a positive day for us, but that brought the mood down a little bit,” she said.
“We have a lot of depth in A and B grade. I’m not worried, I know we will be able to fill the spot, and whoever does that will do a really good job. We have plenty of options.
“We won’t change anything, we’ll still do our training and stick together closely, which will be important for our week off.”