Australian Football

The Lakers have been a consistent force in the Ballarat Football League from their inception. After reaching the finals in their debut season of 1995 they went within an ace of taking out the flag the following year. However, after topping the ladder heading into the finals and defeating Daylesford in the second semi final they suffered the ultimate disappointment of a 52 point grand final loss to North Ballarat. (The margin in no way reflects the scale of the ignominy endured by the Lakers, whose tally of just 1.6 (12) equalled the record low for a BFL grand final. Moreover, the Roosters team which inflicted the defeat was effectively only a reserves combination as their seniors had migrated to the VFL.) The 1997 season ended in similar anguish for the Lakers after Sunbury proved marginally superior in the premiership decider.

The first decade of the twenty-first century saw the Lakers experiencing mixed fortunes. By 2009 they looked capable of mounting a genuine bid for premiership glory but went down in the grand final against Redan by 20 points. The defeat only served to fuel the team's ambition and in 2010 they finally made the big breakthrough, accounting for Ballarat on grand final day by 55 points, 18.9 (117) to 9.8 (62). Subsequent seasons have, in the main, seen the Lakers continuing as a force and an addition to their premiership haul might well be just around the corner. For example, in 2017 they topped the premiership ladder ahead of the finals only to disappoint by losing in both the qualifying final and preliminary final to Bacchus Marsh, thereby finishing third. A year later their finals campaign was brought to an end at the first hurdle by Melton, meaning that they were officially placed sixth.