Sporting News

Pierre De Coubertin Award Winner- Mikaela Street

Pierre de Coubertin - He believed that the qualities of initiative, teamwork, sportsmanship and fair play should be encouraged in young people who participated in sports and competitive games.

On International Olympic Day, 191 Victorian students were acknowledged with the prestigious Pierre de Coubertin award.

Congratulations to Mackie on receiving this prestigious award.

This is the first year that Nossal HS has taken part in the Pierre De Coubertin Sport awards ceremony. Every year one student from each school (from year 10-12) can be nominated for this award for being active participants in sport and displaying the Olympic ideals of fair play and sportsmanship.

The prestigious awards are administered by the State Olympic Council (SOC) with a unique opportunity for sport leaders to interact with Olympians at presentation day, tour the National Sports Museum and share in the Rio 2016 celebrations.

This year Nossal would like to congratulate Mikaela Street (Year 12) for the application that best met the selection criteria and for being Nossal’s first nominee to receive this award at the state presentation.

Mikaela has shown a high level of involvement and sportsmanship in the school Physical Education program and a wide range of school sports including Athletics, Swimming, Netball, AFL and Basketball. She has also been coaching Basketball outside of school, captained a representative team and mentored younger players to promote positivity, solidarity and fair play. She was selected for a USA Basketball tour which allowed her to uphold these values and be an ambassador for her community on an International Scale.

Mikaela along with our School Vice Captain Stacey Loizou were both able to attend the Olympic Academy during the day at the MCG and National Sports Museum. They said it was a fantastic experience to talk with Olympians and other students leading the way in sport around the state.

During the evening, Mikaela received her award from Loudy Wiggins (Diving Dual Bronze Medallist) and Nicole Livingstone (MC- Swimming Silver and Dual Bronze Medallist) in front of a packed house including her parents and myself.

As Baron Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the Modern Olympics said “The most important thing in the Olympic Games in not to win but to take part, just as the most importing thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle.”

Ms. Chantelle Aarts

Nossal Sport Coordinator

For more information about these awards, the students and the Olympians on the day visit the following website: http://corporate.olympics.com.au/soc/vic/2016-pierre-de-coubertin-awards-and-olympic-academy

Table Tennis - Casey Division and Beyond!

No doubt many of you are enjoying the Olympic Games in Rio. I know I am. While not on the same level as our Olympians, some of our students have been excelling in Table Tennis here at Nossal.

For the zone event in Term 2, we fielded four teams:

Intermediate Girls: Yasmin Lay, Jade Roman, Venusha Wimalasiri, Elita Pinto, Mariam Malak & Tia Vechoorettu.
Intermediate Boys: Soham Waingade, Edwin Li, Dermott Chiang, Pranav Mahajan, Vivek Ravinthiran & Jackie Lu.
Senior Girls: Joyee Koay, Siew-Wei Lim, Lina Le, Maddy Tran & Mahima Sharma.
Senior Boys: Kevin Luong, Cody Su, Paul Ou, Evan Lim, Jason Tran & Shang Zhao.

Our first event day was on Thursday June 16 at Dandenong Table Tennis Association. The Casey North Division games were against schools such as Berwick Secondary, Gleneagles, Fountain Gate, Lakeside Lutheran College, and Casey Grammar. It was a clean sweep for Nossal and all four teams advanced to the regional finals or preliminary finals.

Our senior girls qualified directly to the Southern Metropolitan Region (SMR) Finals which were held at Dandenong. The Senior Boys team also joined them after prevailing against KC Acacia at the SMR preliminary final held here at Nossal on Tuesday July 19.

Both senior teams reached the final at SMR only to be vanquished by our perennial nemesis, MacRobertson Girls and Melbourne High (they have won the State finals more often than any other team in the last two decades).

The journey thus ended for our senior boys for 2016. However, due to their strong performances as Runners Up against MacRobertson Girls, our Senior Girls team was invited to participate in the State finals held at Melbourne Sports and Aquatic Centre (MSAC) on Tuesday August 9.

Below is an account of the day from our Senior Team captain, Joyee Koay.

Mr Loi Tran

NHS Table Tennis Coach

The Senior Girls had the privilege of competing in the State Finals against some of the top schools in the state. As expected, all of the Select Entry schools (yes, including Suzanne Cory) were present on the day competing in their relevant categories.

Playing the state finals in the building where some of our current Olympians have trained, we encountered some former state players scattered throughout the schools such as Balwyn and MacRob. Of course, this was a challenge well anticipated and actually gave us the chance to extend ourselves in an environment that wasn’t part of our everyday routine.

With the hard work, training and excitement our team went through, we received 4th place overall, an achievement that has not been reached by another team at Nossal. So now with the bar set, let’s aim for future years of more improvement and greater success.

I would like to thank Ms Aarts for organising the events and Mr Martin, Mr Tran and Kevin Luong for helping to train our players. Thanks also go to all our parents and guardians for their support and for the students themselves for participating.

All the best to our Intermediates Boys and Girls as they prepare for the SMR finals in October.

Joyee Koay - Year 11

Senior Team Captain