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WHITE Hills made more of its scoring opportunities to beat Mount Pleasant and win its first Heathcote District league under-17 premiership since 2000 on Saturday.
Mount Pleasant had three more scoring shots, but it was the Demons who prevailed 8.7 (55) to 5.13 (43) at Huntly.
The Blues were inaccurate from the outset. They dominated the opening term, but could register just four behinds as they squandered the chance to apply early scoreboard heat.
Later with the game having been in the balance at half-time, the Demons proved why the third term is known as the "premiership quarter" when they made their match-winning move kicking to the highway end.
The Demons kicked four unanswered goals in the third quarter - three of them to best-on-ground Nicholas McKinley, including one after the siren - and by the final change were well in command with a 28-point buffer.
"We had our backs to the wall early with the amount of play Mounts had... they could have put us away in that first quarter, but to the boys credit they stuck to it and worked hard and got the job done," White Hills coach Lachlan Sawyer said.
"We played a really good third quarter and from there we never took the foot off their throat.
"Pressure footy is what got us to today and that's what we brought again and it has got us a flag, so it's a great result for the club."
Mitch McConnell (four) and McKinley (three) provided the key avenues to goal for the Demons, combining for seven of their eight.
The best players for the Demons featured McKinley, Patrick Crawford, Liam Nihill, Jacob Meersbergen, David Carter and Nicholas Wallace.
For Mount Pleasant, Fletcher White battled valiantly up forward to kick four of the Blues' five goals.
As well as the contribution from White, the Blues were best served by Ned Burke, Andrew Clover, Felix Bickley, Jack Teasdale, Bailey White and Liam Ledwidge.
White Hills' premiership victory ends a season in which the Demons finished on top of the ladder, while it also broke a hoodoo given the club had lost its previous four under-17 grand finals in 2015, 2014, 2011 and 2006.
The under-17 triumph was one of six flags won by White Hills on Saturday.
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