University of Auckland Continue Badminton Dominance

The Auckland Badminton Stadium recently hosted the National Tertiary Badminton Championship and Tertiary Badminton Cup events, two divisions of competition that provide students of all abilities across Aotearoa the opportunity to participate. Included in the championship for the first time ever was a local secondary school invitational team, consisting of students from Auckland Grammar School and Epsom Girls Grammar School (you can read more about how their participation highlights and strengthens the development pathway from secondary to tertiary education thanks to this article from Badminton NZ).

The University of Auckland entered the weekend as pre-tournament favourites thanks to their team that was stacked with representative talent. They made a predictably fast start to the tournament, emerging from pool play without dropping a single game. Following them into the top 4 finals was the University of Otago, perennial contenders who comfortably beat Waikato and Massey 4-1 each.

Group B was a different story, as the secondary school team held the edge over the university teams. Under the tournament regulations they couldn’t progress to the finals though, so despite defeating all three of their university opponents it was AUT who eventually finished top of the group followed by Victoria University of Wellington.

The University of Auckland’s dominance continued through Sunday, firstly dropping Victoria 5-0 in the semi-final then repeating the scoreline against their local rivals AUT in the grand final. Amazingly, they didn’t drop a single match over the weekend as they won all five ties 5-0, extending their dynasty to six titles in a row and an astounding nine of the past 10. Victoria managed to capture the bronze medal, as they defeated Otago in the third-place playoff, 3-2.

In the Tertiary Badminton Cup it was team ‘What’s Our Name?’ formed by students from the University of Auckland who took home the cup, defeating ‘Team Ella Pan’ 3-2 in the final. Both teams went undefeated in pool play on Saturday to top their groups, before emerging from difficult semi-finals to ensure themselves a medal. Team ‘Choice’ overcame a serious injury to one of their team members on Saturday to claim the bronze medal, defeating ‘Ruffled Feathers’ 5-0 in the third-place playoff.

Check out the full and final results from the National Tertiary Badminton Championship and Tertiary Badminton Cup below.

Championship

1st University of Auckland

2nd AUT

3rd Victoria University of Wellington University of Canterbury

4th University of Otago

5th Secondary School Invitational

6th University of Canterbury

7th University of Waikato

8th Massey University

Spirit – Massey University

Cup