After 3 cancelled or postponed games, Taunton Tigers Womens season eventually started with a difficult local derby against closest rivals Plymouth Raiders. No Taunton Tigers Womens side has ever beaten the well-established and more experienced side Raiders in any previous National League encounters. The last meeting of these teams, in the pre-season tournament resulted in a narrow win for the Tigers. However, this was not a form pointer for this game, given Raiders strong start to the league season. New coach, Steve Green, had put the Taunton squad through some active pre season training sessions and ensured the squad were as well prepared as possible for the season ahead. The pre-match team talk encouraged the Tigers side to run the boards hard and take the game to their more experienced opponents.
Tigers got off to a cracking start, moving the ball at speed and filling the lanes to split the Raiders defence in a regular fashion. With a high percentage of jump shots dropping, Tigers took an early lead of 13 – 2 after only 5 minutes, with Emily Farthing and Hannah Maddocks, featuring particularly strongly at the offensive end. Raiders eased themselves back into contention as Coach Green rotated his bench and as a few handling frailties came to the fore, however, Tigers maintained some momentum to lead 17 – 10 at the break.
Plymouths defense remained fairly dominant throughout the third quarter and restricted Tigers looks at the basket. That said some good offensive work by Jenny Ridgway and Emily Farthing allowed Tigers to open up a 7 point lead before a run of 6 unanswered points by the Raiders allowed them to close the quarter trailing by only 2 points at 35 – 33. Once again, more woes struck the Tigers as Aimee Brook received a hand injury and had limited participation on court whilst receiving treatment
Early scores for Plymouth took them into a lead for the first time in the game as they led by 4 points with 4 minutes remaining. Tigers fought back to get level, whilst Plymoth picked up team fouls and Tigers went to the line no less than 9 times in the quarter, picking up 7 invaluable points from 18 attempts. With less than 2 seconds to go, Tigers were 3 points up when Chrisie Robinson, the Raiders coach, hit a heart-breaking (for Tigers!!) 3 point shot to take the game into overtime at 49 points apiece.
Overtime was a scrappy affair, not least because Tigers had seen victory snatched from their grasp, but also because Raiders were now on the ascendancy and led 52 – 51 with 2 minutes remaining. Two foul shots from Jenny Ridgway restored Tigers lead; one foul shot from Kira Ruiz levelled the score; Tigers had possession with 3 seconds left — a pass to Hannah Watkins — a speculative shot from the half way line — 3 points on the buzzer — what a heart-stopping way to finish a game!!!
Tigers coach, Steve Green commented after the game,
“This was an excellent win for the girls, and was a real team effort. I was really pleased with the way that the girls performed both defensively and offensively and also their never say die attitude. We dealt with the threats posed by Plymouth extremely well and we are continuing to make tangible progress. There are so many positives that we will take away from todays game, including the manner with which the team gelled together on its first league outing of the season.”