By Francesco Cautillo
The TMU Bold women’s basketball team won 51-33 against city rivals the University of Toronto (U of T) Varsity Blues in the second game of the Metro Hoops Classic at the Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC) on Wednesday night.
The Metro Hoops Classic is a cross-city rivalry announced on Oct. 18, 2024. Created to be a new rivalry series between TMU and U of T to highlight the basketball culture in Toronto, the two-night event featured double headers for the two schools’ men’s and women’s basketball teams.
The first round was played on Nov. 1, 2024, at the Goldring Centre for High Performance Sport at U of T, where the Bold women’s team won 59-45. In the rematch at the MAC, the Bold replicated their efforts.
“We take pride in winning the city and owning the city by trying to win these games against York and U of T,” said Bold head coach Carly Clarke.
The Bold came into the Metro Hoops Classic with a five-game win streak. Their latest came in an away win against the Ontario Tech Ridgebacks, where TMU dropped 83 points for their second-biggest win of the season.
The MAC seemed empty at first but quickly filled up with Bold fans by the second half of the game.
The Bold fans were accompanied by special guests from the new Women’s National Basketball Association team. Toronto Tempo president Teresa Resch and the team’s head of marketing showed up for the Toronto rivalry, happy to represent the future of women’s basketball in Toronto.
Clarke expressed enthusiasm about having the Tempo in Toronto, adding the Bold are “excited to have a relationship with them and that they’re out supporting basketball at all levels.”
“It’s huge for basketball in our country and for women’s basketball in our city,” she said.
The Bold tipped off the game without second-year guard Catrina Garvey in the starting lineup. Garvey was seen wearing a black ‘injury’ shirt in warmups. Clark said that “a lot of people stepped up in different ways” in her absence.
“It’s been a full team effort and our defence has helped us when we don’t have [Garvey] scoring,” she said.
Third-year forward Jessica Keripe has been one of those players to step up to fill her teammate’s shoes, averaging around 20 minutes of playtime in the last four games.
Clark mentioned that Keripe has been “tremendous” and is a “huge force defensively and dynamic on offence.”
Keripe mentioned that through ups and downs, her surge in playing time has been a goal of hers and she is glad to spend more time on the court.
“I feel like defence is what drives me personally. I take pride in it,” said Keripe on the “defensive force” her coach talked about. “I start with that and let everything flow from there.”
Fifth-year guard Kaillie Hall opened the scoring for the Bold with a free throw in the first minute. However, the Varsity Blues responded strongly with plenty of intensity defence and six points in the first five minutes. The first quarter ended with a buzzer-beater three-pointer from first-year Bold guard Magdalena Vukojev, who hasn’t had game time at home since Nov. 2, 2024.
Hall led the Bold to a strong second quarter. After her season-high 24-point game last Saturday against Ontario Tech, the Bold star took charge of the game despite being heavily marked by U of T’s defence.
The Bold continued to pick up the pace in the second quarter. Back-to-back unanswered three-pointers from Hall as well as fourth-year guard Jayme Foreman kicked off a strong run of play.
After some points from second-year forward Hailey Franco-DeRyck and another three-pointer from Hall, the Bold extended the lead to eleven points with just under two minutes left in the half.
The Bold ended the first half with a defensive confidence boost after holding the Varsity Blues to four points in the quarter, bringing the score to 25-12 after 20 minutes of play.
With seven minutes left in the third quarter, the Varsity Blues couldn’t seem to get by the Bold defence and found themselves 16 points behind. The rest of the quarter wasn’t any better for U of T, who were still looking for their first three-pointer of the night heading into the final frame.
Their excessive fouls and lack of offensive consistency proved too big a crutch to overcome and they found themselves down 37-19 heading into the fourth quarter.
The Bold continued to keep their foot on the gas with a three-pointer from fourth-year forward Haley Fedick to kick off the quarter. From there, though the U of T offence stepped up a bit, TMU cruised into the final minutes with a 17-point lead, leaving smiles on fan faces and sighs on those who travelled the few Toronto Transit Corporation stops from St. George Station.
Franco-DeRyck was one of the stand-out players in this matchup, picking herself up a double-double of 10 points and 10 assists.
The Bold cruised to their sixth straight victory with a dominant 51-33 win on home court, made better by the fact it came against the Varsity Blues.
“It feels good to get a fairly comfortable win,” said Clarke.
UP NEXT: The Bold will start the final stretch of the regular season by hosting their division rivals, the McMaster Marauders, on Feb. 1 at the MAC. Tip-off is set at 6 p.m.
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