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We Won!
Team Vic Creates History
The Victoria University team has won the prestigious NZ University Games Shield for the first time away from Wellington at the recent 2008 NZ University Games.
The New Zealand University Games is the Flagship University Sporting event in New Zealand. The first Uni Games was held in 1902 with 3 sports being contested - Tennis, Athletics and Debating. Now over 100 years later the Uni Games attract over 2200 participants in 31 sports and is one of the largest annual multi-sport events in New Zealand.
The Shield is awarded to the Games Overall University Champion and was first awarded in 1923. The Shield is steeped in history and tells the tale of the sporting prowess of the Universities of New Zealand and their ongoing mission to be the best.
In April 2008 the games were held in Rotorua. This was first time the host has been a non university town. Given this, there was no home town advantage for any single university. The big guns to decide the shield were Auckland University, AUT, and Victoria University. Victoria were the clear underdogs. Victoria had a larger constraint to participation given the greater travelling distance to Rotorua. In addition, the two Auckland universities have healthy reputations as sporting institutions.
Team Vic consisted of 270 athletes and was the largest contingent. With the weather gods conspiring and delivering some of the worst weather in games history and several off field dramas it really does highlight the effort Team Vic put into competing for and winning the shield. The point’s format for the games no longer consists of participation points meaning that Team Vic won completely on merit.
Debating continued their dominance at the games winning their 10th straight title. Another highlight was the gold winning 1 point victory of the Men’s Basketball over fierce rivals Monash (Melbourne Campus and overall Australian University Games Champions). For a full run down on results check out the University Sports NZ website.
Team Management would like to give a big THANK YOU to all the Victoria University students for your commitment to Team Vic for uni games. We would also like to thank the sport managers who assisted in recruitment and team preparation for the games. These efforts were the backbone for a successful Team Vic. To both VUWSA and The Establishment your ongoing support for Team Vic is greatly appreciated. Winning the shield is proof that your generous contributions make a difference.
With the games being held in New Plymouth in 2009 we have an excellent opportunity at defending the shield. Never has Victoria won the shield back to back and never in the modern era has any university won the shield back to back. If you are studying at Vic next year we would love to have you onboard.
Gold medal winners:
Men’s Basketball
Men’s Volleyball
Women’s Volleyball
Men’s Beach Volleyball
Nathan Bramley for Men’s Cross Country
Debating (Vic 1)
Peter Kim for Fencing (Sabre)
Men’s Football
Michael Pittams for Men’s Squash
Stephanie Smith for Women’s Squash
Daniel Baxter for Men’s Tennis
Silver medal winners:
Josh Potaka for Men’s Aquathon
Chantelle Cowlrick for Women’s Aquathon
Women’s Basketball
Debating (Vic 2)
Jono Coates for Men’s Cross Country Mountain Biking
Stephan Gerschewski for Men’s Table Tennis
Men’s Table Tennis (Doubles)
Ultimate Frisbee
Men’s Waterpolo
Women’s Waterpolo
Bronze medal winners:
Bradley Hudson for Men’s Aquathon
Rebecca Rogers for Women’s Aquathon
Men’s Badminton
Women’s Beach Volleyball
Kolja Schaller for Men’s BMX
Luke Crozier for Fencing (Sabre)
James Lawton for Karate (Kata)
Kathryn Campbell for Women’s Downhill Mountain Biking
James Bringham Watson for Men’s Orienteering
Men’s Touch
Waka Ama