Tauranga Boys' College rounded off the Rankin Cup national secondary schools hockey tournament in Tauranga on a positive note, with a 5-1 triumph over Burnside High School on Saturday.

The result means the team finish the tournament in 15^th place.

A first half Sam Britain goal and four more in the second spell to Matt Pinkerton, Oliver Puchner, Thomas Leslie, and Connor Garner ensured the team finished in a good space after finding life tough in the playoff stages.

The team went into the event staged on the Tauranga Hockey Centre and Boys' College turfs with high hopes, and began the week on the front foot with three straight 2-0 wins in pool play. That put them into the top 16 group to compete for the prestigious Rankin Cup, the symbol of high school hockey supremacy first contested in 1923, while the bottom 16 went on to play for the India Shield.

The standard of opposition moved up a level for them though as they got to the round of 16, with a Wednesday afternoon matchup against reigning champions Christ's College. The Christchurch School dominated the match taking it out 6-1.

Thomas Leslie and Matt Pinkerton mount an attack.

Thursday's match in the playoffs for positions nine to 16 against another Christchurch school St Andrew's College followed a similar pattern. Boys' College found themselves struggling to deal with the mainlanders' skill level, and went down 5-1.

That left them with a matchup on Friday against Super 8 champions New Plymouth Boys High, which began promisingly when Connor Garner put them a goal up in the 13^th minute. They held that lead until half time and then doubled it with a Matt Pinkerton strike six minutes after the break.

From that moment on however the Taranaki side was the only one in it. Three goals in nine minutes put them in front, then although Garner levelled it again with a penalty stroke a further burst of three to New Plymouth in the final stages gave them a 6-3 win.

Sam Britain looks to find a way past the scrambling St Andrew's defence.

'Our aspiration for the tournament was top eight,” says team manager Logan Gemming, 'but we knew we had to get out of our pool, so the boys did that really well.”

Once they got to the cross-over stage, though, they knew they needed to take it up a gear.

'The realities of a national tournament kicked in. Although we'd love to be higher it's probably an appropriate place for us at the moment.”

The first playoff match against Christ's College was a wakeup call, he says.

'I think the biggest thing is we were probably a bit overawed by the situation and the boys were a bit nervous and shell-shocked.

'They had some key players that we talked about but we probably gave them too much credit and we didn't really play. And we were so defensive that Christs just ran away with it.”

Although the St Andrew's match was also one-sided on the scoreboard Logan believes the team learned some lessons.

'We actually fronted up, and I thought it was a competitive game. They're more clinical at the moment and taking their opportunities, and we're struggling to convert ours.”

While they faded in the second spell of the New Plymouth game the lessons proved valuable in putting five past Burnside to leave the tournament on a high.

Thomas Friskney guards St Andrew's College's Etienne Harrington-Watt