FOUR Tamworth hockey players' path to the Australian under 15s hockey championships will start this weekend.
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Mackenzie Scott, Jack Marshall, Makenna Barnett-Suey and Blake Scicluna have all been selected to represent NSW at the championships but before then they'll turn out at the Regional Challenge on the weekend.
The quartet will represent the Northern Inland Thunderbolts and will be joined by 1000 under 13s and 15s hockey players who will compete at the challenge which runs from Friday to Sunday.
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It will be hosted by Tamworth for the first time and it is also the first major event at the complex since it's state-of-the-art upgrade.
"It's great to be at Tamworth's new complex, it's a fantastic facility to be able to run it," Hockey NSW player pathway manager Richard Willis.
The competition will be strong at the Regional Challenge but the competition will go up another step at the 15s nationals on April 9-15.
They will be held in Bathurst where Barnett-Suey will play in the girls State team with Scott in the girls Blues side and Marshall and Scicluna in the boys Blues team.
It is the first time Scott has been chosen for NSW with the selection fulfilling a long-held goal for the teenager.
"I was really excited when I first got selected because I've been wanting to get in the team for a while now," Scott said. "I've been wanting to get into this team for three years. I've been training really for a good six months to get into the [2021] team - six months of real full-on training to get in."
A squad of 70 was first selected before being whittled down after two trials.
Following the hard work, Scott admitted to feeling "half confident" she would get selected: "And a bit nervous. I didn't know what to expect. It was just the anticipation. Would I get in? What's going to happen?" she said.
Scott was expecting all the teams to be "really strong" at the championships and was looking forward to the competition as well as bonding with her new teammates.
Hockey New England are also represented at the under 15s championships with Tom Ball to play for the boys Blues team.
Meanwhile, a handful of players from the region will also take part in the Australian Under 18s Hockey Championships at Launceston on April 8-16.
Tamworth's Oliver McGill has been selected in the men's State team alongside Hockey New England's Tyler McCann and Ryan Oschadleus while Chelsea Thornton, also from New England, is in the women's State team.
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Ben Jaffrey
Ben is a content curator and journalist for The Land. He has been with ACM since 2015 and first worked at The Area News and then at the Northern Daily Leader. Ben first joined ACM Agri as a digital journalist for all seven agricultural mastheads in 2022 before shifting to The Land full-time in 2023.
Ben is a content curator and journalist for The Land. He has been with ACM since 2015 and first worked at The Area News and then at the Northern Daily Leader. Ben first joined ACM Agri as a digital journalist for all seven agricultural mastheads in 2022 before shifting to The Land full-time in 2023.
