As local clubs start to get their 2026 seasons under way, the Telegraph is taking a look at some of the big sport stories of 2025.
Blasters claim historic 10th CBL title in nail-biting finale
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For the 10th time, Seymour has been crowned the Country Basketball League North East Men’s division champions.
In a historic evening for the club, the Blasters ousted Wallan in a game full of huge momentum swings, clinging on in a nail-biting finish to claim an 82-78 win, becoming the first team since the formation of the CBL to reach 10 titles.
Coach Craig Hockley was thrilled with the result.
“It’s a really great achievement by the team,” he said.
“It was very rewarding, actually, finishing the season off with a win.”
But even a coach of Hockley’s experience and calibre couldn’t escape the fact that it was a close-run finish.
While Seymour had built an early lead, the Panthers seemed to find their groove as the main interval neared and, with a flurry of buckets as the clock wound down, reduced Seymour’s lead to just four points by the half.
But it was a different story as the two sides returned to the court.
Wallan scored the opening bucket of the half, cutting the margin to two points.
Slowly but surely the Blasters pulled away, turning the ball over with fierce defensive pressure, before converting at will in attack.
“We really focused on the first three or four minutes of the third quarter, which we’ve done all year,” Hockley said of the start to the second half.
“We had a bit of a lead (at half-time) and we just wanted to build on that lead, but we didn’t change anything around too much, just made sure our defence was working hard.
“And then Tyler Best shot the lights out in that quarter and gave us that 19-point buffer.”
While Best was on fire in the third, the Blasters’ hot hand was cooled significantly in the fourth.
The Panthers roared back to within two, but Hockley used all of his experience to assuage the fears of his troops.
“You have to call a couple of timeouts, which we did, and just try and remind them that we need to stay calm,” he said.
In a tense finale, the Blasters hung on to win by four points, much to the delight of the huge home crowd and despite being outscored 12-27 in the final term.
Seymour dominates decider to be crowned B reserve premier
As far as grand finals go, Seymour’s performance in the Goulburn Valley League B reserve netball decider was as close to the word dominant as you could get.
The Lions never looked troubled in their pursuit of the cup, storming home to defeat Euroa 45-29.
It was the Magpies that made the hot start to the contest; however, the Lions soon asserted themselves, with Shona Gesler and Chloe Locke capitalising inside the shooting circle to put through the next five goals to make an early break.
Euroa finally broke the streak of unanswered goals; however, the Lions continued to forge ahead, roaring out to a 15-4 advantage by the quarter-time siren.
It looked as though the Lions would deliver on their dominance throughout the year to convert an easy triumph, but Euroa didn’t wilt, and began to claw its way back.
Seymour widened the margin to a game-high 19-8 lead early, yet the Magpies dug deep to respond, slowly but surely cutting the lead, coming within six goals with a few minutes remaining before the half, although a missed shot on goal stalled Euroa’s momentum, with the Lions taking it down the other end to go up 23-16 at the main interval.
The intensity had gone up a notch, and Euroa had lifted; however, Seymour looked to slow the charge as the two sides took to the court for the third term, pushing the lead once again out to nine goals. The Magpies cut the lead back to six with a flurry of goals; however, the Lions looked like they had plenty in the tank, again easing out to a 32-23 lead by three-quarter time.
It would take something incredible for the Magpies to claim the win from nine goals down. They made the brightest possible start, opening the scoring in the fourth quarter to cut the lead back to eight goals, and looked to carry on with it from there.
Within a matter of minutes, however, Seymour had put the result beyond doubt.
Avenel’s Swan-song in debut season a hit tune
At the start of the 2025 pre-season, the Avenel Swans’ under-15s side had six players.
Avenel had never fielded an under-15s side before, but history is always there to be made.
By season’s end, the Swans had done more than establish a fresh side on the park.
They claimed maiden silverware in their maiden season.
As key forwards Blake Jones and Jackson Fraser kicked the opening goals of the game, Avenel never looked like relinquishing its lead to Nagambie.
Nagambie staged good moments late in the first term, but was unable to capitalise. At quarter-time, the Swans led by two goals.
Jones claimed a strong contested mark at the top of the goal square to kick a second, as Avenel controlled the tempo and territory in the second quarter.
Xavier Bush clunked a pack mark and kicked the first goal for the Lakers, but an end-to-end overlapping chain saw Sonny Taylor nail a dribbler from the top of the goal square.
The Swans’ back six were unwavering as Nagambie tried to respond.
In the second half, the Swans produced an untouched three-disposal chain for Conrad Brown to goal from after the opening clearance.
The third term is often stated to be the premiership quarter, and the Swans proved that to be the case, as Cooper Atlas and Blake Benham sailed through majors to pull away from the Lakers.
The Swans piled on four third-quarter goals to lead 8.7 (55) to 1.3 (9) at the final change of ends.
It was party time in the last term as Avenel fired another four goals to comprehensively dispatch Nagambie by 63 points, 12.7 (79) to 2.4 (16).
Tallarook completes A-grade three-peat
Tallarook has sealed a remarkable three-peat in the Seymour District Cricket Association A-grade competition, capping off a dominant season with a ruthless victory over Yea in the grand final.
Heading into the final as favourites, the Rooks were asked to bowl after losing the toss.
But with the very first delivery of the contest, skipper Lachlan Watts foreshadowed a commanding individual performance, removing Yea opener Marc Steiner for a golden duck.
Watts claimed a second scalp shortly after, with Josh Cunningham stumped to leave Yea at 2-13, which quickly became 3-13 as Blake Munari-O’Dwyer took care of Edison Waghorn.
Munari-O’Dwyer soon had wickets four and five on the board for Tallarook, sending Cameron Armstrong and James Lincoln back to the pavilion with the scorecard reading 5-25.
Yea skipper Andrew Butterworth was able to dig in; however, the number four was running out of partners, with Thomas White and Will Dalton both falling for seven runs, and while the Tigers managed to break 100, they were unable to advance much further.
Paul Clue added 10 before he became the eighth Yea wicket to fall, the Tigers having amassed 101 runs, with Austen Ross not far behind as Yea slumped to 9-104.
Butterworth remained at the crease on 46, having dragged his side to three figures, but even he was unable to survive the bowling of Watts, who wrapped up the Yea innings at 10-104.
Having claimed a wicket with the very first ball of the contest, Watts finished with scarcely believable figures of 4-5 from 7.1 overs, three of which were maidens, well-supported by Munari-O’Dwyer (3-24), as Tallarook put itself in a strong position to chase down the 105 required for victory.
Tallarook openers Joshua Rudge and Mitch Itter made a positive start to the chase, eating into more than half of the Yea total before Itter was dismissed by Butterworth for 23, leaving the Rooks one down for 56.
The removal of Itter brought Watts to the crease, and the skipper was just as good with the bat as he was with the ball, belting five boundaries as the home side roared towards victory.
After getting his side off to a brilliant start, Rudge was removed by White for 43, less than 20 runs from victory, as Leigh Irving joined Watts in the middle.
Fittingly, it was the captain, Watts, who hit the winning runs, finishing unbeaten on 32 to go with his bowling figures of 4-5 in a man-of-the-match performance, leading by example as his side stormed to its third premiership in as many seasons.