USSA News National competitions create a feast of university sport action While December may have been a period of rest and recuperation for many as 2022 drew to a close, it was quite the opposite for student athletes and the University Sports association of South Africa (USSA), which organised no less than seven national competitions across the last month of the year. With the academic year in sync with the calendar year in South Africa, final examinations were followed by tests of a different kind on the pitch, court, table and sand as many students in their final year were able to bow out of their student careers in style with one final sporting hoorah. Kicking off the month was the annual USSA Beach Volleyball Championship, held in the coastal city of Gqeberha. After three days of scintillating action on the sand, the University of the Western Cape emerged victorious in the women’s division, while the University of Pretoria served, jumped and spiked their way to success in the men’s competition. From the sand to the court, the inland city of Potchefstroom hosted this year’s USSA Tennis Championship, a mixed event dominated by the University of the Free State (UFS) in recent years. Keen to continue their streak, UFS overcame University of Pretoria in the final to extend their record and win an impressive tenth consecutive victory. On the cricket pitches in South Africa’s capital city, hosts University of Pretoria prevailed in the four-day USSA Cricket Championship, narrowly overcoming North West University in a tense final to take home the gold medal. A total of 186 participants from 13 different universities gathered at the Sol Plaatjie University in Kimberley, putting their minds to the test in the year-ending USSA Chess Championships. The final “check-mate” in the women’s competition was proudly uttered by University of Pretoria’s Nina Marais, while the king of the black and white board in the men’s tournament was UFS’s James Dinham. It was a slam dunk for Vaal University of Technology (VUT) in the USSA Basketball Championships held in Johannesburg. With the finals taking place on the fifth and final day, VUT ladies successfully defended their title to overcome University of Pretoria, and continued their celebrations into the men’s final, watching their colleagues topple University of Johannesburg as they made the top step of the podium well and truly theirs. Continuing with the theme of clean sweeps, the coal-mining town of Secunda played host to the USSA Football Championships, played simultaneously with the FIFA World Cup in Qatar, providing optimal motivation for both the men and women taking part. And in the end, the ’Orange Army’, as University of Johannesburg is commonly known, took overall honours, claiming victory in both the men’s and women’s categories to end the year on a high. And finally, in the last championship organised for the year, the University of Stellenbosch made a splash at the USSA Water Polo Championships hosted by Varsity College. Not to be left out among the victorious universities at previous championships, both their men’s and women’s team remained unbeaten across the entire tournament to take home gold, signing off a busy but successful month, and year, for South Africa university sport. Posted by Fabio De Dominicis on 05 Feb, 2023. Source: FISU