It won't make up for a season of underachievement but the Bay of Plenty Steamers are looking to wrap their Mitre 10 Cup campaign on a high this afternoon against Northland, and give the Tauranga Domain faithful something to remember them by.

Last week's 26-22 victory over Southland came too late to help them into the top four playoff positions in the Championship division after their six match losing streak broke the back of their promotion ambitions.

They can look at a couple of matches where the bounce of the ball could have been more co-operative, and the injury curse has certainly hit them more heavily than in their memorable season last year when just a thrilling extra time final loss to Wellington stood between them and promotion, but head coach Clayton McMillan says at the end of the day they know where to look for liability.

'We're naturally disappointed that we haven't achieved what we set out to achieve at the beginning of the year. There's a number of things that have contributed to that but ultimately we can't blame anyone other than ourselves.

'But it was nice to get a win last weekend, and the boys have been a bit banged up but certainly fully engaged and enthusiastic this week. So we're looking forward to it actually.”

Sunday's match in Invercargill came close to adding to the Steamers' season of woe when Southland came back hard at them after they'd established a healthy lead, but Clayton says in the end his troops showed a bit of the resilience he's been looking for through the season.

'That was another game we got off to a bloody good start, and then in the second half we struggled in a little bit of wind to get out of our half and they scored a couple of tries, and it became a real ding-dong battle.”

It says something about how far they'd fallen from grace that Southland were seriously targeting the game to break their two-year losing streak.

'We came up against a really hungry side and it was great to see a little bit of composure to get the win late in the game.”

Semifinalists Northland will be a step up this afternoon, and will have plenty of motivation to pick up the win to potentially get up over Otago into third and avoid a playoff against the red-hot Waikato team.

One point in the Steamers' favour though for Clayton is that despite the injury curse striking again he's largely been able to stick with the team that got up over Southland.

'In a perfect world we love to be able to get some consistency in selection,” he says, 'because we think we've seen a little bit of growth in the blokes we've been putting out there.”

He's also been able to find room for a couple of the exciting up-and-comers from the Bay's Jock Hobbs Memorial tournament-winning under 19 team in the 23, including wing Emoni Narawa in the starting 15 and Cole Forbes on the bench.

'The fact that we're out of semifinal contention does give us the opportunity to test the waters with these guys and I'm sure they'll acquit themselves well.”

Narawa's inclusion along with prop Jeff Thwaites swapping in from the bench for Ross Geldenhuys are the only changes to the starting 15.

Blindside flanker Tyler Ardron will again captain the side and earn his blazer for his 15th game in the blue and gold hoops.

The match follows the sudden-death relegation playoff for the Bay of Plenty Volcanix against Auckland which will determine whether they stay in the Premiership division for next year's Farah Palmer Cup.

Jade Tuilaepa's return at halfback is the big selection news for the Volcanix, moving Ora Williams back to first five.

Coach Brendon Webby has also made just one change in his starting forward pack, with prop Braxton Walker coming in at loosehead prop ahead of Angel Mulu.

The Bay of Plenty union is putting the focus on raising awareness for mental health and well-being for the double-header.

Prior to kickoff a number of non-playing Steamers will be involved in getting 50 kids moving as part of the Mainfreight Steamers day encouraging the importance of being active to stimulate positive well-being.

And the Steamers will continue to help generate awareness for mental health by playing in purple socks.

Bay of Plenty Steamers lineup to take on Northland (appearances in brackets):

1 James Lay (19), 2 Tom Crozier (7), 3 Jeff Thwaites (30), 4 Baden Wardlaw (7), 5 Kane Le'aupepe (7), 6 Tyler Ardron (14)** (c), 7 Mitch Karpik (15), 8 Hoani Matenga (8), 9 Luke Campbell (25), 10 Kaleb Trask (6), 11 Fa'asiu Fuatai (9), 12 Terrence Hepetema (27), 13 Liam Steel (13), 14 Bailey Simonsson (6),

15 Chase Tiatia (34)

Reserves:

16 Valentine Meachen (2), 17 Josh Davey (2), 18 Ross Geldenhuys (9), 19 Aaron Carroll (8), 20 Zane Kapeli (6), 21 Richard Judd (17)/Isaac Te Aute (19), 22 Trael Joass (5), 23 Cole Forbes*

Bay of Plenty Volcanix to meet Auckland:

1 Baye Jacob (17), 2 Lily Florence (19), 3 Braxton Walker (6), 4 Kate Henwood (19), 5 Amanda Aldridge (11), 6 Kendra Reynolds (25), 7 Les Elder (9), 8 Christie Yule (18) (C), 9 Jade Tuilaepa (9), 10 Ora Williams (12), 11 Emily Magee (4), 12 Renee Wickliffe (5), 13 Hana Tapiata (14), 14 Polly Playle (12), 15 Sapphire Tapsell (19)

Reserves:

16 Kura Hudson*, 17 Rawinia Luka (4), 18 Calli Perrott (20), 19 Mikyla Wardlaw (11), 20 Te Rina Mohi (2), 21 Tania Raharuhi (13), 22 Olivia Richardson (3)

Farah Palmer Cup:

Bay of Plenty Volcanix vs. Auckland Storm

Kick-off 11.30am

Mitre 10 Cup:

Bay of Plenty Steamers vs. Northland

Kick-off 2.35pm

Tauranga Domain, Tauranga

Gates open at 11.00am