Who dares wins.<\/p>\n
Well, what happens when the teams double-dare each other?<\/p>\n
Something terrific, that\u2019s what.<\/p>\n
Otago and Tasman kept delivering the crazy.<\/p>\n
And the home team was just a little more nuts.<\/p>\n
Defence and structure were abandoned for razzle and dazzle.<\/p>\n
Otago turned a 28-19 halftime lead into a 57-33 win in front of nearly 3000 fans at Forsyth Barr Stadium on Friday night.<\/p>\n
Here is the raw data.<\/p>\n
Thirteen tries. Ninety points. The occasional tackle.<\/p>\n
The game actually started quite conventionally.<\/p>\n
Tasman strung phase after phase together.<\/p>\n
But Riley Lucas released the pressure valve for Otago with a break in the midfield. He found Jake Te Hiwi, who carried the ball strongly into the 22.<\/p>\n
But there was a little knock-on and the opportunity went begging.<\/p>\n
Hooker Henry Bell orchestrated a rolling maul which Tasman brought down illegally.<\/p>\n
But the home team could not turn the field position into points.<\/p>\n
Tasman snatched a turnover and wriggled their way out of trouble.<\/p>\n
Former All Black Shannon Frizell made a punishing carry and they got the ball out to prolific try-scorer Kyren Taumoefolau and he dived over.<\/p>\n
Otago first five Cameron Millar left for an early HIA and did not return. His replacement Patrick Pellegrini responded for the home side.<\/p>\n
He muscled over out wide and bounced the conversion over off the post as well.<\/p>\n
It took some desperate defence by Jona Nareki and Sam Nemec-Vial to prevent Tasman from hitting back immediately.<\/p>\n
Tasman had another dip and fullback Maloni Kunawave cut back inside to dot down.<\/p>\n
But a brilliantly worked lineout move saw Josh Whaanga go in under the posts.<\/p>\n
It was the sort of plan which works at training but seldom during an actual game.<\/p>\n
Tasman produced their own kind of wonderful moments later. David Havili burst through a gap and got a chicken-wing offload to Kunawave.<\/p>\n
Macca Springer loomed up in support and finished off with an athletic dive at the corner.<\/p>\n
The tries kept coming.<\/p>\n
Te Hiwi will probably never get an easier one.<\/p>\n
Harry Irving charged down a clearing kick. It rolled dangerously in front of the posts to the second five, who just had to pick it up and flop over.<\/p>\n
The final few minutes of the half were dazzling.<\/p>\n
Otago halfback Kieran McClea picked off an intercept and set off for the corner some 90m away.<\/p>\n
Springer ran him down \u2014 just.<\/p>\n
Tasman recovered the ball and counter-attacked.<\/p>\n
But Nemec-Vial got his hands on it and drilled a 50-22.<\/p>\n
And guess who emerged from the lineout drive with a five-pointer \u2014 Casey, of course.<\/p>\n
He has scored in every game this season.<\/p>\n
Otago went into the break with a 28-19 lead.<\/p>\n
It had been frenetic.<\/p>\n
And the straps stayed fastened in the second spell.<\/p>\n
Otago stretched their lead with a sublime try early in the second half.<\/p>\n
Nareki finished it off in the corner. There had been a series of scarcely believable offloads in the lead-up.<\/p>\n
The defence was not at the same standard.<\/p>\n
Kunawave went through a hole at the other end moments later.<\/p>\n
It was loose but lively.<\/p>\n
Finn Hurley had entered the fray and immediately made a scintillating break. The Otago fullback has other-worldly abilities.<\/p>\n
But Casey is not bad either. He got a sneaky offload to Te Hiwi, who went around a defender and got a sneaky offload to Lucas, who scored.<\/p>\n
Pellegrini brought the half-century up with a penalty.<\/p>\n
It was the only time either side opted for a sedative.<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
NPC<\/p>\n
The scores<\/p>\n
Otago 57<\/p>\n
Patrick Pellegrini, Josh Whaanga, Jake Te Hiwi, Lucas Casey, Jona Nareki, Riley Lucas, Kieran McClea, Finn Hurley tries; Pellegrini 7 con, pen<\/p>\n
Tasman 33<\/p>\n
Maloni Kunawave 2, Kyren Taumoefolau, Macca Springer, Nic Sauira tries; Cooper Grant 4 con<\/p>\n
Halftime: 28-19<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Who dares wins. Well, what happens when the teams double-dare each other? Something terrific, that\u2019s what. Otago and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":597262,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-597261","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597261","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=597261"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/597261\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/597262"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=597261"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=597261"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=597261"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}