FOR a moment at the Orange Hockey Complex on Saturday, it looked as though a massive women’s Premier League Hockey upset was brewing.

Confederates sprung out of the blocks against Bathurst St Pat’s, with young gun Eva Reith-Snare hammering home the match’s first goal at the 11-minute mark to see the red and blues edge to a 1-0 lead early in their round nine outing against the perennial Bathurst big guns.

Built on strong defence and a willingness to attack not seen from a Feds team since their return to the premier league in 2012, the red and blues’ advantage was no fluke.

But it was only for a moment.

Earning a massive share of possession - a percentage that netted the blue and whites 10 short corner opportunities before Feds earned their first in the 63rd minute - St Pat’s gun Kath Messer scored a stunning hat-trick to gift her side the points and maintain hope of a top five berth in 2015.

St Pat’s captain Brigette Evans said in the face of a spirited Feds outfit, patience was key to getting over the line.

“Lot of team work ... and I think fitness is something we’ve worked on all year and we looked the fitter side today,” she added.

Evans said had her side better executed its opportunities, the scoreline may have been a little different too.

“Incredibly frustrating ... we definitely need to improve on that,” Evans said, the 10 short corner chances - six of which came in the first half while Feds were on top - an area St Pat’s can improve on.

“To have that many opportunities, coming into harder games down the track, that’s something that’ll definitely cost us.”

Feds stand-in coach Sam Stevenson said with her side being as young as it is, they’ll take any little victories it can muster - and leading St Pat’s 1-0 until the 25th minute is one of those little victories.

“That’s what we want,” Stevenson said.

“Especially for the young ones, we’re lacking a bit of finishing and today was good because it showed we can compete and finish in the circle.

“We were up, we had a lot of the attacking play, but they capitalised on their chances and I think we need to do that too.”

Down 1-0 after Reith-Snare’s cracker to open the scoring, St Pat’s fired back thanks to Messer with 10 minutes to go in the first half, before goals in the 40th and then 58th minutes, both to Messer, secured the result.

Both of Feds keepers - Steph Hinds and 14-year-old Kathryn Cox - were brilliant, as was their opposite in blue and white, Mckenzee Newton, whose full-stretch parry of an Annie Pakinga shot at goal brought a massive cheer from the vocal St Pat’s support that made the trip to Orange.

Just their second win for the year, Evans was banking on it being one her side can build from.

“Hopefully that’s the start of many. We need to get on a bit of a roll on or we’re ruling ourselves out of semis,” she said.

BATHURST ST PAT’S 3 (Kath Messer 3) def CONFEDERATES 1 (Eva Reith-Snare)