Devs: Undefeated Hawks Secure Home Final

THE Box Hill Hawks won their 15th game of the season on Saturday at Preston City Oval against the Northern Blues. The 109-point win securing the top spot on the ladder and a home final for the undefeated side. 

It was an exciting day for the Hawks as Liam Tobin, who was forced to pull out of last weeks game in the warm due to injury, was able to run out for his 100th game with Box Hill. 

“Last week my back seized up in the warm up and I couldn’t bend down. I had a good week at training getting my body right so it felt amazing to get out there and reach that milestone,”said Tobin.

“I’ve been at the club for a long time and I love it. I’m really excited to be able to reach my 100th game at such a great club.”

Box Hill took a while to get into the game with undisciplined mistakes, missed opportunities and failing to finish off play with goals. 

Liam Tobin put this down to the Hawks overuse of the ball. 

“I think the boys wanted to share around the ball and get everyone involved, which is good but we needed someone to take that ownership and kick the goal.”

“I think we thought we had less time than we really did. We came in at quarter time and addressed this and refocused ourselves.”

“We also had to increase our tackles and hard ball gets which would then generate our run and create scoreboard pressure.”

It was evident in the second quarter that Box Hill had shaken off their rusty start as they began to play in true Hawk style, taking their lead to 48-points. 

As the game went on the Hawks increased their pressure around the ground and on the scoreboard. Box Hill were able to shut down the Blues who were only able to score 15-points from the end of the first quarter until the final siren.

In his 100th game, Tobin was the leading goal kicker for the Hawks, ending up with 5 goals. Box Hill finished with 11 individual goal kickers.

The final scores showed Box Hill (143) a huge 109-points ahead of the Northern Blues (34).

The Hawks will head back to training this week and prepare for a home game against Williamstown before heading into finals.

Final Sores: 

Box Hill Hawks: 4.8  9.15  15.20  19.29 (143)

Northern Blues: 3.1  3.3  3.3  5.4 (34)

Goals: Tobin 5, McEvoy 4, Graham 2, Webster, Crocker, Hardisty, Murphy, Franetic, Evans, Kidd, Switkowski

Bests: Murphy, Exon, Hardisty, Lewis, McEvoy, Monkhorst

Photo Credit: Jenny Owens