Sandy Spikers End Tip Top Run at Coota Beach
(Apologies to the Sandy Spikers the real winners of the Coota Beach Volleyball Festival. I had the Wham Ram All Stars as the winner when originally posting this article. )
The 10th Coota Beach Volleyball Festival took place on the weekend on 20-21 February 2010. For the past seven years it was Tip Top Canberra that had taken out the title.
Tip Top were once again back to take on all-comers at the Coota Beach. The beach was created on Friday afternoon after the trucks dumped hundreds of tonnes of sand on Murray Street. Four courts were setup along the street with one permanent court adjacent.
The Coota Beach Volleyball Festival weekend is one of the big events for the local community. The population is less than 8000 and with 84 teams in the six-a-side tournament perhaps ten percent of the town were down at the beach. There could have quite easily been more than 84 teams as at least ten were knocked back.
It was a carnival atmosphere with young kids all the way to the more senior locals giving it a go.
On Saturday each team played three grading matches to establish the rankings for day two. There were then an A, B, C and D division.
On Sunday it became clear there were two teams most likely to make the final. Tip Top Canberra and the Sandy Spikers were looking good. As the matches were played on Sunday it was in fact those teams that met under the hot Cootamundra sun in the final.
The Sandy Spikers got out to an early lead before the seven-time defending champions pulled back. The match unlike regular volleyball was played in two ten minute halves. With around five minutes to play the Tip Top team were ahead 12-9 only to see some great hustle and a big block or two from the Sandy Spikers to get them level at 14-14.
The full-time hooter sounded and it was the first team to get a two point advantage. The Sandy Spikers edged ahead 15-14 then on the next point there was a huge rally which saw the ball going back and forth until the ball was hit out by the Tip Top team.
The Sandy Spikers had done it.
The weekend was a great event. It was well run and the Tip Top Canberra team conducted two coaching clinics for the local kids. It was great to see how keen the kids were and how quickly some of them could pick up the skills of volleyball. If they continue they will show up their parents.
Congratulations to Cootamundra for putting on such a great event.
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