Heartland Championship

Heartland Championship

Current season, competition or edition: 2016 Heartland Championship
Competition logo
Sport	Rugby union
Founded	2006
No. of teams	12
Country	New Zealand
Most recent champion(s)	Meads Cup: Wanganui Lochore Cup: North Otago

The Heartland Championship competition, known for sponsorship reasons as the Mitre 10 Heartland Championship, is a domestic rugby union competition in New Zealand. It was founded in 2006 as one of two successor competitions to the country's former domestic competition, the National Provincial Championship (NPC). The country's 27 provincial teams were split into two separate competitions. Thirteen of the original teams, plus one merged side created from two other teams, entered the new top-level professional competition, the Air New Zealand Cup (now known as the Mitre 10 Cup). The remaining 12 sides entered the new Heartland Championship, whose teams contest two distinct trophies, both named after legendary New Zealand players:

• The Meads Cup, the more prestigious trophy, named after Colin Meads.
• The Lochore Cup, named after Brian Lochore.

The Competition

The Heartland Championship is held annually, and starts in August. Rugby teams from 12 provincial unions compete.

Points are earned during the competition based on the following schedule:

• 4 points for a win
• 2 points for a draw
• 0 points for a loss
• 1 bonus point for scoring 4 or more tries, regardless of the final result
• 1 bonus point for a loss by 8 points or less

Prior to 2011

Prior to the 2011 Competition, the tournament was conducted in three rounds.^[1] This was similar to the structure of the 2006 Air New Zealand Cup, but that competition collapsed its first two phases into one effective in 2007. At the start of Round One, the 12 teams would split into seeded pools of six teams each, Pool A and Pool B. Seedings were also based on positions in the previous year's competition. During Round One, each team would play the other teams in its pool once. All teams would have either two or three home fixtures, with the three highest seeds in each pool at the start of the season receiving the extra home fixture.

All teams would advance to Round Two. The top three teams in each pool advance to the Meads Cup, while the bottom three teams enter the Lochore Cup.

Round two saw each team in both the Meads and Lochore Cups playing the three teams that it did not play during Round One. The three teams with the most competition points in Round One would play two home fixtures and one away, while the other three teams would play one home fixture and two away.

All competition points from Round One carried over to Round Two, and the competition points earned in both rounds determined the teams that advanced to the semifinals of each Cup in Round Three. The top four teams in the Meads and Lochore Cup competitions at the end of Round Two advanced to the semifinals.

Round Robin

This round sees the 12 teams playing 8 games each. 1st to 4th on the ladder at the end of the 8 weeks will play off for the Meads Cup, while 5th to 8th play off for the Lochore Cup.

Finals

The Meads and Lochore Cup winners are both determined in four-team single-elimination tournaments. The semifinal matchups are seeded 1-4 and 2-3, with the higher seed receiving home field advantage. The highest surviving seed hosts each Cup final.

Heartland Championship teams

A map of current NZRU union boundaries, including teams competing in both the Mitre 10 Cup and Heartland Championship

The Heartland Championship is contested by the following teams:^[1]

	Team	Super Rugby partner	Hometown	Home stadium	Capacity[2]
	Buller	Crusaders	Westport	Victoria Square	5,000
	East Coast	Hurricanes	Ruatoria	Whakarua Park	3,000
	Horowhenua-Kapiti	Hurricanes	Levin	Levin Domain	6,500
	King Country	Chiefs	Taupo	Owen Delany Park	20,000
	Mid Canterbury	Crusaders	Ashburton	Ashburton Showgrounds	5,000
	North Otago	Highlanders	Oamaru	Whitestone Contracting Stadium	7,000
	Poverty Bay	Hurricanes	Gisborne	More FM Rugby Park	18,000
	South Canterbury	Crusaders	Timaru	Alpine Energy Stadium	12,000
	Thames Valley	Chiefs	Paeroa	Paeroa Domain	3,000
	Wairarapa Bush	Hurricanes	Masterton	Trust House Memorial Park	10,000
	Wanganui	Hurricanes	Wanganui	Cooks Gardens	15,000
	West Coast	Crusaders	Greymouth	Rugby Park	6,000

Prior to 2006, East Coast, North Otago, Poverty Bay and Wanganui competed in Division Two of the NPC, alongside Counties-Manukau, Hawke's Bay, Manawatu, Nelson Bays and Marlborough (all promoted to the Air New Zealand Cup, Nelson Bays and Marlborough merging to form Tasman). The remaining teams competed in Division Three of the NPC.

Winners

Year	Meads Cup Winner	Lochore Cup Winner
2006	Wairarapa Bush	Poverty Bay
2007	North Otago	Poverty Bay
2008	Wanganui	Poverty Bay
2009	Wanganui	North Otago
2010	North Otago	Wairarapa Bush
2011	Wanganui	Poverty Bay
2012	East Coast	Buller
2013	Mid Canterbury	South Canterbury
2014	Mid Canterbury	Wanganui
2015	Wanganui	King Country
2016	Wanganui	North Otago

Meads Cup winners

Team	Titles	Runners-up	Years
Wanganui	5	4	2008, 2009, 2011, 2015, 2016
Mid Canterbury	2	2	2013, 2014
North Otago	2	1	2007, 2010
East Coast	1	1	2012
Wairarapa Bush	1	—	2006
Buller	—	2	—
South Canterbury	—	1	—

Lochore Cup winners

Team	Titles	Runners-up	Years
Poverty Bay	4	—	2006, 2007, 2008, 2011
North Otago	2	2	2009, 2016
South Canterbury	1	3	2013
Buller	1	3	2012
King Country	1	1	2015
Wanganui	1	—	2014
Wairarapa Bush	1	—	2010
Horowhenua-Kapiti	—	1	—
West Coast	—	1	—

See also

• ITM Cup
• National Provincial Championship
• List of New Zealand rugby union teams

References

1. "Division One 2006: Competition Structure." AllBlacks.com, accessed 2006-08-20. PDF.
   Before the "Heartland Championship" name was adopted, this competition was tentatively called "Division One" of the NPC.
2. "2013 Pink Batts Heartland Championship Media Guide". AllBlacks.com. 13 August 2013. Retrieved 12 April 2016.

External links

• Heartland Rugby website