Hockey One Round 3 Wrap: Four Clean Sweeps, a Derby for the Ages, and Brisbane’s Ten-Goal Statement
Round 3 of the Hockey One League did what a good round should do. It cleared up the table a bit, and it gave us one game nobody will forget in a hurry.
Four clubs swept the weekend. Canberra Chill, Perth Thundersticks, Brisbane Blaze and HC Melbourne all won both their women’s and men’s games. Fifty-two goals went in across the round, 35 in the men’s games and 17 in the women’s. That’s a lot of hockey, and most of it was good.
Canberra started the round on Friday night in Hobart, in steady rain, and came away with a double over Tassie Tigers. The women won 4-2, with Valentina Costa scoring twice, and the men held on 4-3 after racing to a 2-0 lead inside 13 minutes through Davis Atkin and a Darcy MacDonald corner. Dylan Brick scored twice in three minutes after half-time to make it 4-1, but Hayden Beltz converted two corners for Tassie and Oliver Stebbings scored a field goal in the 60th minute to set up a nervy finish. Canberra held on. Their men are still perfect after three rounds.
Perth took both games in Sydney on Saturday, and both followed the same pattern. Fast start, then a strong defensive finish.
The women won 3-2 over NSW Pride. Courtney Schonell scored in the 14th minute, and her conversion made it 2-0. Abby Wilson pulled one back, Madi Ratcliffe restored the two-goal margin from a corner, and Kendelle Tait’s field goal just before three-quarter time set up a tense last quarter. Perth held on, and their women are now the only unbeaten women’s side in the competition.
The men won 3-1. Daykin Stanger scored a field goal and its conversion inside the opening 12 minutes. Blake Govers converted a corner in the 28th minute, his goal in every game this season, but Brodee Foster restored Perth’s two-goal lead within the same minute. It was Perth’s first men’s win of the season, and Pride’s first loss.
Brisbane’s Indigenous Round gave the round its biggest scoreline. Both sides wore Indigenous strips, Brisbane in Charli Bliss’s “Connecting Communities” design and Adelaide in Mya Damon’s artwork honouring the Kaurna people’s connection to Country. On the pitch, Brisbane recorded their first wins of the season, and both were emphatic.
The women kept a clean sheet in a 3-0 win. Rosie Malone opened the scoring in the 20th minute, and second-half corners from Jamie-Lee Surha and Sara Strauss finished it.
The men went behind to Freddy Waters in the fourth minute. Then they scored ten unanswered goals. Seven different Blaze players scored. Hayden Pease converted two corners, and Noah Fahy and Matthew Hawthorne each scored a field goal and its conversion, as Brisbane won 10-1. That’s the kind of result that changes a season’s mood in one afternoon.
Sunday in Parkville gave us the first Melbourne derby, and it lived up to it.
In the women’s game, Lahni Woodger’s first-half field goal gave the Cobras the lead. Mihaylia Howell answered in the 49th minute with a field goal and its conversion, and HC Melbourne won 2-1. That handed the Cobras their first loss of the season.
The men’s game was even wilder. Peter Scott’s field goal and conversion put the Cobras 3-1 up early in the third quarter. Abu Mahmood completed a hat-trick in the 54th minute to restore a 5-4 lead after Ky Willott had levelled. Then HC Melbourne scored four goals in four minutes. Ben White’s field goal and conversion turned the game around, and Nathan Ephraums did the same on the final whistle to give the reigning premiers an 8-5 win. Ephraums finished with a hat-trick of his own, and Mahmood’s was the other derby hat-trick of the day.
Three men’s sides are still perfect: Canberra Chill and HC Melbourne at 3-0, and Perth’s women are the only unbeaten women’s side. That sets up Round 4 beautifully. It opens on Friday 30 October in Canberra, where the two unbeaten men’s sides, Chill and HC Melbourne, meet in the opening game of the double-header. On Saturday, Tassie Tigers host Brisbane Blaze in Hobart and Adelaide Fire welcome NSW Pride, before Perth Thundersticks close the round against Melbourne Cobras in Perth on Sunday 1 November, with the Thundersticks women looking to stay perfect and the Cobras men chasing their first win.
For our money, Friday night in Canberra is now the game of the season so far. Two unbeaten sides, one of them at home, and the winner takes a real grip on the top of the table.
Related links:
https://sportscursor.com/hc-melbourne-8-5-melbourne-cobras-first-derby-25-october-2026/
https://sportscursor.com/hockey-one-round-4-chill-hc-melbourne-top-table-30-october-2026/
https://sportscursor.com/hockey-one-women-round-4-thundersticks-perfect-run-30-october-2026/
https://sportscursor.com/rankings/
