KwaZulu-Natal’s senior men’s captain Dale Morphew (right) in action against Western Province during the 2016 South African Canoe Polo Championships at Shongweni Dam just outside Hillcrest this past weekend.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div> The KZN men\u2019s side had lost to Gauteng in their first game in the round robin stages however had fought back to claim a 4-4 draw in their second encounter of the day, setting up the final between the two sides after KZN had beaten Western Province 8-4 and 8-0 previously.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The final was a ding-dong battle with both outfits eager to gain the ascendancy and, ultimately, the national crown.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was, however, the underdogs, KZN who kept their cool and fought off their more fancied opponents to claim a 6-2 victory in a well-contested final.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Gauteng had earlier dismantled Western Province 11-2 and 13-1 in the round robin pool stage, putting them in the pound seats heading into the final.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It was the hosts who managed an unlikely victory though to claim their second national canoe polo title in three years after Gauteng stole the title from them in 2015.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In the ladies division the contest throughout did not represent the same see-saw battle that the men\u2019s did, the KZN Women\u2019s team proving too strong for the rest of the provinces and went through the entire tournament conceding just nine goals while they sent the ball into the back of the net close on 40 times.<\/p>\n\n\n\n KZN Women\u2019s final saw them clash with their toughest opponents, the Gauteng U21 Women\u2019s team, however the game was relatively one-sided as the KZN ladies ran out 5-1 victors, claiming the well-deserved spoils and repeating their victory of 2014 in the process.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The Under 21 Men\u2019s division was the only section that KwaZulu-Natal did not manage to win, having to settle for the silver medal following a closely contested 4-2 loss to Gauteng in the first final of the day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The KZN U16 boys\u2019 team were also in fine form throughout as they cantered away with the junior final\u2019s spoils where they downed the Gauteng Homies team 5-1 to make it three of the four gold medals on offer for the host province.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Chairman of the South African Canoe Polo committee Chris de Bree was happy with the way the entire event unfolded and heaped praise on the organisers and the players for making the event such a success.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe event was most definitely one of the most enjoyable and well organised national championships to date,\u201d a satisfied De Bree mentioned. \u201cThere are some future stars coming up the ranks and it is exciting to see the high level of play between provinces.<\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cThe organising committee was happy with the fact that the event has grown from only seven teams to 12 teams and were delighted to a U16\/development division for the first time in history.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n The canoe polo focus now shifts to the Durban International Canoe Polo Festival that takes place at the same Shongweni venue from 18 to 19 June.<\/p>\n\n\n\n SUMMARY OF RESULTS – SOUTH AFRICAN CANOE POLO CHAMPIONSHIPS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Senior Men: 1.KwaZulu-Natal, 2.Gauteng, 3.Western Province Shongweni Dam \u2013 The 2016 South African Canoe Polo Championships dished up some enthralling excitement at Shongweni Dam over the weekend as the less-fancied KwaZulu-Natal team were too strong for Gauteng in the senior men\u2019s final whilst the KZN ladies made it a double with victory over the Gauteng ladies in a one-sided affair. KwaZulu-Natal’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":200,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sa-champs"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=223"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/223\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.canoepolo.co.za\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/SAChamps-2016-1024x683.webp\")
<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n
Senior Women: 1.KwaZulu-Natal, 2.Gauteng U21, 3.KwaZulu-Natal U21
U21 Men: 1.Gauteng A, 2.KwaZulu-Natal, 3.Gauteng B
U21 Women: 1.Gauteng U21, 2.KwaZulu-Natal U21
U16 Open\/Development: 1.KwaZulu-Natal U16, 2.UMZ Development, 3.Gauteng U16<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"