By Mitchell Fox
The Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Bold women’s basketball team earned their second victory in the Darcel Wright Memorial Classic with a 69-63 victory over the Wilfrid Laurier Golden Hawks on Saturday afternoon at the Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC).
The win means the Bold will get a chance for revenge against the University of Saskatchewan Huskies in the tournament final on Sunday. The Huskies beat the Bold 73-57 in the championship game last year.
“They’re one of the best teams in the country. I think we’re up there too,” said Bold head coach Carly Clarke. “This is the last pre-season game before the regular season starts. So to play a great team, we’ll learn a lot and continue to work on getting better.”
TMU opened their tournament with a 66-55 win over the Cape Breton University Capers on Friday, while the Golden Hawks earned a 65-60 victory over the Concordia University Stingers. Saturday’s matchup featured a showcase of the two teams’ strength and skill.
Both teams came out of the gates flying, with turnovers and quick ball movement at the forefront. Fourth-year Golden Hawks forward Janet Enge opened the scoring with a layup, then third-year forward Kate White hit a fast-break layup, giving Laurier a head start and setting the stage for a first half full of transition scoring.
The Bold answered in a hurry. Second-year guard Catrina Garvey put them on the scoreboard with a three-pointer. Then, a pair of layups for graduate forward Kaillie Hall, a foul shot for second-year forward Hailey Franco-DeRyck and a fast-break lay-up for fourth-year guard Jayme Foreman gave the Bold eight unanswered points.
Clarke said the ability to turn defence into quick offence helped the Bold get going.
“We want to play with that pace all the time. Some games it comes a little bit easier. Some games tougher,” she said. “We were able to get some stops and get out and run.”
Foreman’s game took off a couple of minutes later as she hit back-to-back three-pointers to give the Bold a 14-6 lead. She proved unafraid to shoot throughout the game, making four of six three-point attempts along with seven of 12 field goal attempts.
Clarke said Foreman is finding her rhythm again after missing some time with injury.
“[Foreman is] a great shooter,” she said. “To have her do that today, that’s really encouraging for our team, because we just have so many weapons and she’s one of those great ones.”
With the score tied at 14-14, it was Garvey’s turn to take over. After breaking the tie with a floater, she assisted graduate forward Callie Wright’s lay-up at the baseline, then hit a three-pointer of her own.
The back-and-forth action continued in the second quarter as fifth-year guard Cassidy Hirtle got Laurier’s scoring going but second-year guard Alex Pino quickly answered for TMU. The Bold scored in transition again when Pino turned a defensive stop into an assist to Foreman on the fast-break opportunity. However, from there, the Golden Hawks came surging back with a seven-point run.
With the two sides missing shots from distance but finding fortune with lay-ups and short-range jump shots, both teams continued to trade punches.
The Bold closed out the half with a pair of scoring plays to increase their lead to 38-31. Third-year guard Kait Nichols earned her first points of the game with a deep two-pointer, then Garvey hit a layup, one of her eight field goals on 18 attempts in the game.
“[Garvey has] a scorer’s mentality, and is able to do that in a variety of ways, which makes her difficult to guard,” said Clarke. “She didn’t make as many threes today, but she found some other shots and she also had four assists, which is really, really important.”
Those points proved necessary in the second half, which belonged to the Golden Hawks. High-flying action returned with fast-break points and contested layups both ways, but the Bold’s distance shooting slowed down.
Clarke said the focus on the bench in the middle portion of the game was to clean things up defensively.
“We made a lot of shots early and that made things maybe look a little bit more comfortable than they were,” she said. “We knew they were going to fight back. So we were just trying to make sure we were finding ways to get stops.”
The Bold shot 62.5 per cent in the first quarter, compared to under 38 per cent in each of the other quarters.
Third-year forward Zoe Idahosa brought a gritty edge for the Bold, grabbing rebounds, a steal and driving the net hard after subbing into the game with the score at 44-42. She eventually sunk a basket to get the Bold lead to four.
Laurier managed to bounce back, as Hirtle shined. The Sarnia, Ont., product scored an immediate three-pointer and a layup to give Laurier their first lead since the opening minutes. Hirtle finished the game with 21 points, a team-high.
Clark said it was valuable to play a strong, veteran team like the Golden Hawks.
“For us to play in close, competitive games as we get close to the season is what we want,” she said. “This is where we learn about ourselves and get better.”
As the Bold continued to miss shots in the third quarter, Laurier maintained possession by controlling the majority of loose balls in the paint. However, Clarke called a timeout following a three-pointer from first-year Golden Hawks guard Ella Thomas.
The timeout allowed the Bold to regain momentum and end the quarter with a three-pointer from Pino to tie the game at 51-51.
The Golden Hawks tried to push further in the fourth quarter but Foreman and Garvey halted any attempt for an extended lead. Both guards were held to a combined six points in the second and third quarters, but they rebounded in the fourth with eight and six points respectively.
As the game got physical in the final five minutes, foul trouble for the Golden Hawks helped the Bold turn the tide. Foreman’s shooting proved to be a fair measure for how the game was going for the Bold.
Her swift three gave the Bold a 64-61 lead.
Clarke said different players can have days where their shooting impacts the trajectory of the game. Today, that was Foreman.
“The ball found her hands, she found great rhythm shots,” she said. “That’s what makes our team great, is we’ve got lots of people that can step up in those moments.”
After Garvey extended the lead to five points with a layup, Laurier’s efforts to fight back came with three consecutive fouls, which allowed the Bold to maintain the difference. The game’s last point came on a foul shot for Hall as TMU finished the game 69-63.
The Bold now prepare for a tough matchup with the Huskies, made tougher by its timing at the end of a three-day tournament. Clarke said it won’t say a lot for the season ahead but is an important opportunity.
“Third game in three days, there’s gonna be some fatigue on both sides, and both sides have a couple little injuries, but [it’s] certainly like a measuring stick of what we need to work on,” said Clarke.
UP NEXT: The Bold will take on the University of Saskatchewan Huskies in the championship game of the 36th annual Darcel Wright Memorial Classic on Sunday. Tip-off is set for 4 p.m. at the MAC.
Leave a Reply