Tigers delighted following Sacred Heart Grand Final win

SEVEN Torquay Football Club juniors are grinning from ear-to-ear, all achieving one of the highest sporting accomplishments at the secondary school level in the state.

Maddison Jones, Lila Burns, Leila Owens, Sophie Mahar, Mia Barnard, Lila Richard and Ellie McCoy, all student footballers at Sacred Heart College in Geelong, all have premiership medals around their necks following the school’s Herald Sun Shield Grand Final win.

The Division 2 Grand Final took place on Wednesday, September 6 at ETU Stadium in Port Melbourne.

Sacred Heart completed its dominant tournament performance with a 5.8.38 to 2.2.14 win over Melbourne-based school Genazzano.

The win marked the third senior competition win for the school, adding to its Intermediate Girls Division 1 title back in August.

Leila Owens said it was second Herald Sun Shield Grand Final in a row for Sacred Heart, but the school had lost last year’s decider to Heidelberg’s Our Lady of Mercy College.

“It was good this year to one-up ourselves from 2022 and get the win this time round, it’s my first ever Grand Final win and I think it was the same for a lot of others,” Owens said.

“Port Melbourne’s ground was lovely to play on, we’ve played on big grounds like that before such as GMHBA Stadium for the Respect Cup, but it was a pretty cool experience to win a premiership in this one.”

Sophie Mahar said it was a nice change of scenery to play in Port Melbourne, swapping the trees of Spring Creek Reserve for the skyline of Victoria’s largest city.

“We developed all of our skills at Torquay, and we’ve been able to bring those skills over to school, where there were girls who hadn’t played football before, but it was good to have a mixture in the team,” Mahar said.

“Leila and I currently play for Geelong Falcons, so we hope to continue furthering our skills.

“Our coach at Torquay, Clare Murphy, has really stepped up when we didn’t really have a coach at the start of the season, and she provides a different insight to footy, which we love learning under.

“At the Falcons, we’ve been learning under Paul Brogan and Mel Hickey the past two years, and the whole staff there has been great.”

Both girls gave a big shoutout to their school coach in Anthony Petkovic, who said he could not be prouder of his team following the school’s win earlier this month.