By Gabi Grande
After narrowly missing the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) playoffs last season, the Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Bold women’s hockey team has something to prove this year.
The rejuvenated squad, consisting of 21 returning players and six key recruits, are ready to put last season behind them and do whatever it takes to become a championship team.
Head coach Lisa Haley is in her 13th season behind the Bold bench and is looking to build from last season’s disappointing finish.
“As the saying goes, ‘experience means nothing until you have it,’” said Haley. “Everything was so new last year because there was a pretty massive turnover in our graduating players.”
Before the start of last season, about a third of the Bold’s roster either graduated or transferred away from the team. However, one player’s absence is another player’s gain.
Now, second-year forward Eden Dusome skated in every game of the 2023–24 season, recording two assists as a rookie. She said last year’s result was a gritty but strong finish to the season, including a four-game win streak and a 3-2 overtime loss against the University of Toronto Varsity Blues. The defeat left a feeling of hunger for the team heading into year two of a new era.
“We’re trying to bring that energy and intensity for the love of the game into next season and carry over,” said Dusome.
During this past off-season, veteran players had the opportunity to step up and become leaders while regrouping team morale.
Fourth-year forward Cailey Davis recorded five goals and seven assists in 28 games last year and is now an assistant captain for the Bold.
“We took a lot of time this off-season to redefine our team identity and work through what our team culture is,” said Davis. “We want to be the hardest working team in the OUA and we never want to get outworked.”
The team’s spirit wasn’t the only thing boosted this off-season, with six recruits beefing up the already talented roster.
Among those additions is the tandem pairing of Katie Leroux and Nahvin Bal, both hailing from Surrey, B.C. and coming from the Fraser Valley Rush. Leroux served as captain of the Rush and together with Bal captured three provincial gold medals, two provincial silver medals and two Pacific Regional Championships over the past three years.
Likewise, Ava Caputo brings experience from the U18 AAA Red Deer Sutter Chiefs. The Lethbridge, Alta., product earned a provincial silver medal.
The recruiting class is rounded out by three homegrown Ontario talents in Kalysta Song, Dayle Chinnick and Taliya Hildebrandt. Both Chinnick and Song enter the program with provincial honours—the former captured gold in 2017 while the latter did so last season.
Of the team’s 27-player roster, almost half are second-year students and younger. Younger, however, does not mean inexperienced.
Haley said the first- and second-year players bring forward an aggressive, competitive level within the team.
“They’re ready for more. It creates more internal competition with the entire group because there’s more players ready to play bigger minutes,” she said.
The team finished last season with a record of 7-21, which put them last in the OUA East and just four points out of the playoffs. With just 1.7 goals per game (GPG) and 24 shots per game (SPG) as evidence, their five-on-five play was their biggest obstacle all season.
“We need to find a way to generate more offence, more goals,” mentioned Haley. “Goals are hard to come by offensively for us.”
The team also had troubles in their own zone at even strength in 2023–24. Their opponents averaged 2.9 GPG and 33 SPG.
“I think we can do a better job keeping pucks out of the prime scoring area and limiting some opportunities from the other team,” Haley added.
Nonetheless, the Bold’s special teams are where they shined. They capitalized on 14 of 99 opportunities on the power play, good for 14.1 per cent. Their opponents, however, cashed in 13 goals on 109 opportunities against the Bold, or 11.9 per cent.
For the entire duration of the season, the team will hold a designated special teams practice at 8 a.m. on Wednesday mornings.
“[Haley] has said ‘This is mandatory, this is when we’re going to run systems, this is when we’re going to do power play and penalty kill,’” said Dusome.
That commitment to improving in all regards, including their strong suits last year, sums up the team’s mentality heading into a new season. With hopes of making a deep playoff run this year, Haley said responsibility is key.
“Recognizing what a championship culture looks like and talking about it more on a day-to-day basis is where we’re at,” she said. “Our focus [is] on accountability within our group, what goes into making a championship team and the culture that drives that.”
Leave a Reply