• Howick and Pakuranga Times
GONE are the days when New Zealanders’ regular sports diet consisted of rugby, league, football, netball and hockey in the winter, and cricket, softball, tennis, sailing, bowls and golf in the summer.
Young and old in this country are playing many more games and extreme codes than ever before, while traditional and competitive northern hemisphere winter sports are attracting wider participation and interest.
After the large public attention that was grabbed by this year’s exciting Winter Olympics in Vancouver, it’s now firmly established that New Zealanders have a quench for the sports that we’ve watched at distance for many decades and are now having a go at.
One such game is ice hockey and on the South-East Auckland patch, sports fans and players have the good fortune of having one of New Zealand’s best clubs on our turf.
The Botany Swarm, who play out of Paradice Ice Arena, have been national ice hockey league (NZIHL) champions twice in recent years, in 2007 and 2008, and boast past and present Ice Blacks, the national men’s team, on their roster.
Earlier this year, 10 Swarm players were in the 21-man Ice Blacks squad that achieved their best result at a world championship in the 20 years New Zealand has been competing internationally.
They finished fourth at the Division II world champs in Estonia, beating powerful nations such as China 2-1 and Israel 5-4.
The achievement ranks New Zealand 36th in the world, its highest in two decades.
“We want to challenge for a medal. Moving up a place next year and winning bronze would be absolutely huge,” says Ice Blacks head coach Jeff Bonazzo. “People in New Zealand saw the games played at the highest level at the Olympics and said, ‘wow, it’s amazing to watch that fantastic game’. Now they can come out and see it.”
Last Tuesday night, 300 keen spectators – many that turn out regularly for Swarm matches – roared Botany on to a convincing 8-1 victory over the West Auckland Admirals at Paradice.
The Admirals have not beaten the Swarm in six years of battles in the NZIHL and that record wasn’t about to be challenged.
The Swarm swept to an impressive 5-0 lead after the first 20-minute period, as the Admirals seemed to have left their focus in the changing room.
It was a good start to the match, considering it was the Swarm’s third game in four days, after they had just returned from two narrow losses on the road to the national champions, the Canterbury Red Devils, on June 19-20 at Christchurch.
The Swarm added a goal in each of the next two periods against the Admirals, as the visitors clawed their way back into the match, although they only scored one goal.
The goals for the Swarm came from classy stars Charlie Huber (3), Ian Wannamaker (2), Josh Hay (2) and Alexandr Polozov.
All the goal scorers played their part in the victory, with ex-pat
Estonian Polozov, Huber of Germany and Canadian Wannamaker leading the way, supported by strong performances by other gritty New
Zealand reps Jordan Challis and KC Ball, while giant Ice Blacks goaltender (goalkeeper) Zak Nothling was rarely tested.
In the return clash on Sunday at Paradice, the Swarm defeated the Admirals 7-0, with goals by Polozov (2), Ball (2), Andrew Hay, Challis and Huber.
The Swarm now tackles the Dunedin Thunder in a doubleheader of NZIHL games this weekend, with both matches starting at Paradice at 5pm on Saturday and Sunday.
Botany Swarm’s NZIHL home game schedule at Paradice Ice Arena
v Dunedin Thunder, July 3-4, both games 5pm
v Canterbury Red Devils, July 24-25, both games 4.45pm
