It’s 10 years to the day since the Waikato Bay of Plenty Magic made history as the only NZ team to lift the ANZ Championship trophy, and their legacy lives on to this day, Merryn Anderson discovers.
Dame Noeline Taurua can recall exactly what set the Magic team apart from any other franchise in the 2012 ANZ Championship.
“It definitely was about the quality of training, the intensity that’s required and also our ability to back up from one week to another…I keep that same philosophy with me coaching now,” Taurua, now the head coach of the Silver Ferns, says.
That Magic side will forever have their name etched in history, as the only New Zealand team to win the trans-Tasman netball competition.
The ANZ Championship ran between 2008 and 2016 (before being split into two domestic competitions on either side of the Tasman), and the Magic were consistently one of the strongest New Zealand teams in the league. In 2012, a star-studded Magic worked their way to the very top.
After the shock of losing their first four games, the Magic then won 12 matches in a row - the most important on Sunday, July 22, over the Melbourne Vixens in the grand final, in front of over 10,000 fans at Hisense Arena in Melbourne.
In a slow-starting match, the Magic came from behind, winning the final quarter 13-7, to beat the Vixens 41-38. The legendary Irene van Dyk shot 25 from 26 that day.
They were a team stacked with household names - van Dyk, Laura Langman, Casey Kopua and Leana de Bruin all key cogs in the side. The squad also contained a 19-year-old Sulu Fitzpatrick - who's gone on to captain the Silver Ferns - and 23-year-old Erena Mikaere, who, after a few years away with different teams, had a Magic homecoming in 2020 and is still there today.
The mastermind behind it all was Taurua, the coach of the team from 2002 to 2013, who’s hoping to coach the Silver Ferns to a gold medal at the Birmingham Commonwealth Games, starting next week.
Taurua puts the turnaround after four losses down to two things.
“One was the mental refocus - and there’s a lot that goes in and around that, in consolidating or ensuring everyone understands what the strategy is," she says.
“But alongside that, it was our refocus on taking one game at a time and knowing it wasn’t going to be pretty, especially at the beginning of the matches, until we got our links and the combinations. But just getting the job done.”
De Bruin still holds Taurua in high regards, as one of her favourite coaches.
“She made us work really hard and I think what I loved about her was her honesty of where you were at as an individual, but also as a team,” she says. “She drilled us really, really hard when things didn’t go right.”
The 11 consecutive wins in the lead-up to the grand final, including the semifinal against the Mystics (which Taurua remembers could have gone either way) were the perfect preparation.
“As we travelled through the competition, the pressure started to release once we knew what we were doing was successful. But we also got a lot of confidence in each other as well,” Taurua explains. “We had nothing to lose basically and that’s probably how it was treated.”
De Bruin was named the MVP of the grand final, flying out for an intercept to spoil the Vixens’ possession with five minutes left in the final quarter when the Magic were up by just one goal - a play that sealed the win for the Magic.
“That was a moment I’ll probably never forget,” de Bruin says. “I just remember the crowd, it was crazy. They went quiet, especially in the last few minutes, and all I remember is, 'I really need to turn ball around'.”
It was often thought in the early eras of the ANZ Championship that the New Zealand teams weren’t up to par, and the Australian teams would dominate. But the Magic’s win changed public perception.
“It changed the belief that in New Zealand, we actually have the players to beat the Aussies,” de Bruin says, recalling every game against an Australian team felt like an international game.
“They were such high intensity but it just brought belief into what we’re doing over here, and the fact we could come up against some big, big names and still beat them on home soil.”
LockerRoom takes a look at the members of the 2012 Magic team, and what they’re up to now.
Laura Langman
Dubbed the G.O.A.T by netball fans across the world, Langman not only captained the victorious 2012 Magic side, but led the Silver Ferns to their fairytale 2019 Netball World Cup victory before retiring in 2020. She was named joint MVP of the 2012 season (with the Mystics' Temepara Bailey) and went on to play for the Mystics and then in Australia - and earned 163 Ferns caps.
Now living on the Sunshine Coast, Langman coaches a university team, as well as being actively involved with NETFIT, providing netball clinics, coaching, tips and resources for off-court health. And of course the midcourt dynamo isn’t resting, completing a half Ironman last year.
Leana de Bruin
One of seven centurions for the Silver Ferns, de Bruin most recently took the netball court last week for the Mixed Invitational team in the Cadbury Netball Series - at 45 years old. She also played a handful of games in the 2022 ANZ Premiership, both for the Magic and the Stars. The Magic still talk about the 2012 season, she says.
During her short stint at the Magic this year, de Bruin had some advice for the team, who've been struggling for a few seasons now. “I actually used our four-game losing streak as an example and said there’s nothing like when you have your back against the wall and you have to win that things change.” De Bruin, who has one son, is now general manager of a Waikato construction company.
Irene van Dyk
A legend of the game, van Dyk played with the Magic from 2003 to 2013, commuting weekly from Wellington for trainings. She was the most prolific shooter in the 2012 season, shooting 501 goals at 95 percent accuracy. Van Dyk’s mother, also Irene, passed away one day before their preliminary final against the Mystics, and Taurua and the whole team supported her throughout that week and into the final. “I had Mum with me that whole week…the whole Magic team drew strength from that going into that game," van Dyk says in the recent Pure As series. "We just wanted to make it the best game we ever, ever played and we did.”
Now living in the Hawkes Bay, Van Dyk works as Netball New Zealand’s participation manager of youth and heads netball’s pioneering youth board, along with coaching the Hastings High School Old Girls team. But despite a cheeky few calling for her return to court, she happily says her playing days are well over. Her daughter, Bianca, now works for Netball Central.
Casey Kopua (Williams)
No New Zealand netball fan needs to be reminded of Kopua’s achievements - putting her retirement on hold to be a key player in the Silver Ferns’ win of the 2019 World Cup, three years after giving birth to her first child. Kopua played 187 games for the Magic after debuting in 2003, the defender fiercely loyal to the franchise till her retirement at the end of 2019. She now has three kids - six-year old Māia is an older sister to William and seven-month-old Luke. Fellow 2012 Magic champions Jess Tuki and Arahi Wall were bridesmaids at her wedding in December 2012.
Sulu Fitzpatrick
Fitzpatrick was just 17 when she made her ANZ Premiership debut for the Mystics, and went on to play with the Magic, the Steel and the Pulse before returning to the Mystics in 2019. She’s off to the Birmingham Commonwealth Games this month as the vice-captain of the Silver Ferns ready to add more to her 16 test caps. She was the Lois Muir Supreme Award winner at last year's NZ Netball Awards.
Since playing for the Magic as a 19-year-old, Fitzpatrick has had twins, Tevita and Theresa, and has been very open about overcoming struggles with alcohol and her mental health battles. This year she graduated with a Bachelor of Arts in sociology - 11 years after she started her degree.
Erena Mikaere and Leana de Bruin reunited in Magic colours in 2022, 10 years after winning a title together.
Erena Mikaere
Mikaere was the first Kiwi to play as an import for Australia, when she featured for the West Coast Fever in 2015. After stints there and at the Sunshine Coast Lightning (reuniting with coach Taurua), Mikaere returned home and made one test appearance for the Silver Ferns in 2019. The following year she came back to the Magic - her very first team. Next year will see the defender suit up in Magic colours in her fourth consecutive season with the team.
Julianna Wolfgramm (Naoupu)
Wolfgramm was named the best young player of the ANZ Championship in 2012, shooting the Magic to victory alongside van Dyk. She went on to play for Samoa in the 2015 Netball World Cup, ruling her ineligible to be a New Zealand player in the ANZ Premiership until 2020, when she signed with the Northern Stars.
During the first lockdown, Wolfgramm found out she was pregnant and her and husband Kaho welcomed their daughter, Ālisa, into the world. She now works full-time in Christchurch, balancing that with being a mum and also playing club netball.
Elias Scheres (Shadrock)
First playing for the Magic in 2009, Scheres moved south to the Pulse in 2014. She married Joseph in January 2016, then suffered a serious knee injury before retiring from top netball that year. The Scheres have three kids together - Tamati (four), Maia (three) and Nikau (one) - and live on a dairy farm in Putaruru. Scheres teaches at Putaruru College, and has played in a few netball competitions in the Waikato and Bay of Plenty, but played rugby this year - “just to prove my husband wrong and I loved it.”
Jessica Tuki
Double international Tuki had a rollercoaster netball career - at 18, she was called into the Silver Ferns for the 2006 Commonwealth Games, then next appeared in the black dress for the Fastnet Ferns in 2011. She also played basketball, making the Tall Ferns in 2014 and their trials again in 2016.
She and partner, James, moved home to New Plymouth in 2015, and now have three boys - Hunter, Harrison and Harley. Putting her career as an accountant on hold to be a stay-at-home mum, Tuki continues to play netball for Tysons in Taranaki.
She remembers the 2012 season as an incredible one. “The whole team was just so in tune, all pushing and contributing, all asking the same of everyone. It was the best group of girls supported by an amazing management team.”
Jessie Elers (Waitapu)
After two seasons with the Magic, shooter Elers spent a season in England in 2014, playing with Loughborough Lightning, before returning home to Waikato. She has two daughters - six-year-old Avana and one-year-old Amaia - and owns a residential construction company with husband, Carew, as well as working as a chief financial officer for a Waikato property development company.
She still plays netball, even called up as a replacement player for both the Magic and Stars over the past six years. Until last year, Elers coached high school netball teams, including co-coaching St Peter’s Cambridge to a national title.
Frances Solia (bottom right) with the Samoan netball team.
Frances Solia
A legend in Wellington and Samoan netball, Solia retired after her 2012 season with the Magic to start a family, and now has three kids. She runs the Frances Solia Netball Academy, based in Wellington and helps develop the next generation of netball stars. The long-time captain of Samoa became their national coach in 2017, and is currently in Fiji with the team for the Oceania Netball World Cup qualifiers.
Arahi Wall
Wall still remembers the season like it was yesterday, the shooter playing netball every season until this year - choosing to spend more time with her family. She works from home as an investor and in e-commerce business, which allows her to spend more time with fiancé Lance Kautai and two children - daughter Nyal and son Witekoha.
Khao Watts
The Australian midcourter returned home after playing with the Magic, playing for the Fever, Adelaide Thunderbirds and Melbourne Vixens and retired from the professional game at the end of 2018. Watts currently works as a physical education and netball academy teacher in Adelaide, and is a specialist coach for the South Australia Sports Institute and state programme. She welcomed a baby boy, Pat, with husband Tim in 2021.
