Nova Thunder produced a dominant fourth quarter in Newcastle championship netball at National Park on Saturday to beat West Leagues Balance and consolidate third place with finals looming.
Thunder outscored the fourth-placed side by nine goals in the final period to win 50-42 in their round-12 clash then earned a much easier three points on Sunday when BNC forfeited their rescheduled round-three encounter.
It left Nova on 31 points, two behind Souths and University of Newcastle and six ahead of West.
Souths, who are first on percentages, and second-placed University also took maximum points from the weekend double-header.
Lions beat Junction Stella 75-24 on Sunday then won by forfeit against the Tigers on Sunday.
University were 65-20 winners over Kotara South on Saturday then downed West 50-39 on Sunday.
Inner Glow beat BNC 51-16 on Saturday but lost 60-43 to Junction Stella on Sunday.
Nova player-coach Laura Glendenning described Saturday's win as crucial as they eye a challenging run into finals with Souths twice and University once.
"We knew we had to beat West this weekend," Glendenning said. "They were missing a couple of their key players, so we knew if we were going to catch them off guard it was going to be this one.
"But in saying that, they still had a very strong team. They had a number of their [NSW] Premier League players back so it's not like they were lacking experience. We had to challenge and we knew we had to capitalise on anything we could, and that's what we did."
Nova made a strong start, holding a 17-13 lead at the first break after a rain-soaked opening quarter. But West were up 25-24 at half-time then 36-35 heading into the final period.
"I think we adjusted to the rain quicker in the first quarter but West settled into the second quarter and they've got some really quality combinations in their shooting end," Glendenning said.
"We made some changes all over the court come the second half. I put Lucy Geise on at shooter, [wing defence] Alexa Walker and [wing attack] Emma Wyborn backed up from opens and and were both really positive players to come on."
Centre Katie Robinson, who returned the weekend before after planning to have the season off, came on during the second quarter and "brought the energy that we needed".
"From there we built momentum," Glendenning said. "We turned over a lot of good ball, which was great, and we settled and got our groove back, which was good.
"We were a lot more conscious of our passes, a bit more aware of where everyone was and just really patient with what we did with the ball and we capitalised on their mistakes."
