TWO inches, the width of a goal-post.

That’s all that came between Orange and the division two 2016 Hockey NSW Under-18 State Championship last weekend.

Deadlocked at 2-2 deep in extra-time in Sunday’s decider against Canberra, Orange pulled out all the stops, throwing a tricky short corner variation at their opponents in a bid to score and claim the title.

The shot grazed the post.

“Unfortunately it was the outside of the post,” Orange coach Pete Shea said.

“It missed and the Canberra guys scored not long after, so we were about two inches from a state title.

“But it was a really, really great effort. It’s the culmination of a lot of hard work over the past five or six years with this group of guys.

“You look at it, the Canberra side is virtually a state side. They call it their development squad. They obviously train a lot more than us so I’m really pleased the boys’ performance.

“It was a really good team effort, the guys played really well as a group.”

Canberra opened the scoring early in Sunday’s decider before the Orange side hit back with two quick goals, to take a 2-1 lead.

“Canberra scored with about 10 to go in regular time, to even it up,” Shea said.

“We started pushing for that goal to win but we couldn’t score, so we played the first six-minutes of extra-time and then went into the second six-minutes.”

Shea was reluctant to single out too many players in the performance, but did offer special recognition for Ben Cox and Jake Skelton.

“They aren’t guys who normally get talked about and there’s a few like them who haven’t played much hockey at this sort of level, but they were fantastic,” Shea added.

“Ben Cox just played out of his skin and Jake Skelton had a very impressive tournament. But as I said, it was a great team effort, everyone played well.”

Orange trumped North West Sydney (3-0), Bathurst (7-2) and New England (5-1) in their opening three matches and despite a 4-2 loss to Grafton in their last preliminary game, topped pool A.

They played Goulburn in their cross-over semi-final, winning 3-1 to earn a crack at Canberra.