By Mitchell Fox
The Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Bold women’s volleyball team lost in three sets to the Guelph Gryphons at the Mattamy Athletic Centre (MAC) on Saturday afternoon, extending their losing streak to nine games.
The Bold entered the match hungry to bounce back from a straight-set loss on Friday night but inconsistency on various fronts kept them chasing the Gryphons. The result was another loss in their end-of-season pursuit of the Ontario University Athletics (OUA) playoffs.
“I’m proud of the team today. I’m not sure that I would have said it the same way after last night’s match,” said Bold head coach Dustin Reid. “I just thought we played better volleyball overall. So it’s tough. The sport isn’t always fair, and it’s tough that the players don’t get to feel some type of fulfillment.”
He said the Gryphons are a strong team but have not had success this year either—Guelph held a 2-12 record heading into the weekend—but found success with their defensive style. He wants his team to find the same groove.
“The third set is probably the best set we’ve played in 2025,” said Reid. “[It’s] sad to see it not end up in a win but it’s not a time of season where you can sit back and say, ‘Hey, we’re happy with the performance, and it didn’t work out in the result.’ We need some results here.”
From the get-go, Guelph showed signs of the defensive prowess that would power them through the game. Even on points they lost, the visitors dug balls with their feet and hands and employed over-the-back passes to keep the play going.
“I think as a team—and as players on the team—you need to say, ‘Hey, nice play. We can make nice plays too,’” said Reid. “Unfortunately, we’re not there.”
The Gryphons mounted a lead as high as 6-2 on the backs of kills from fourth-year outside hitter Jordan Vang and first-year outside hitter Sloane Fortin as well as a pair of attack errors by the Bold. TMU responded in kind, though, as fourth-year outside hitter Kylie Ferguson took to the line and fourth-year outside hitter Scarlett Gingera got to work as an attacker.
As the two teams traded points, the Bold bench began to get fired up, encouraging their teammates to keep rolling. Nevertheless, a trio of errors from TMU gave the Gryphons a 14-11 lead, a sign of things to come.
First-year middle Rayanna Amos-Ross Fisher got the Bold back to within a point with a couple of short float serves but followed it up with a service error, bringing the score to 17-15.
When the Gryphons got to 22-17, the Bold bounced back with three straight points—including a trick dump play from graduate setter Jasmine Safar and second-year outside hitter Tyra Krapp. However, troubles on the attack reared their head once the score hit the 20s—three straight errors from TMU brought the set to a close at 25-20 in Guelph’s favour.
Amos-Ross Fisher said the Bold need to hit a “go mode” after 20 points, remain aggressive to 25 and not take their foot off the gas.
“I would say we get a bit passive. We kind of lose our aggression,” she said.
Amos-Ross Fisher got the Bold started in the second set with a dump but the Gryphons answered with a hit through the block by Vang, setting the stage for a back-and-forth frame.
TMU’s last lead of the set came at 6-5 when second-year middle Alexandra Nicholson-Clarke began to drive the Gryphons’ offence with her power over the net. Ferguson provided an answer for the Bold with her mix of ground defence and high-flying kills, keeping things close at 11-11.
From there, third-year left side Briar Crerar led Guelph on a run to 16-13. The Bold kept fighting, however, as Ross-Fisher encouraged her teammates with yells of “It’s not over, let’s go!” from the bench.
“Being tough and being resilient, getting back into it is something that is really required in volleyball every single time,” said Amos-Ross Fisher. “I just want to be the loudest one. Our gym is silent so I’m like, ‘You know what? Let’s get the energy going and be aggressive as much as I possibly can.”
Down 18-16, Safar got the Bold going from the service line. She grabbed an ace with a float serve to the front left of the Gryphons’ court before starting a lengthy rally that ended in an attack error by Guelph, bringing the set to a tie.
A 2025 trend of troubles at the end of sets emerged once again at this point as the Gryphons mounted a 7-1 run—led by three kills by Vang—to take the set 25-19.
“We put ourselves in position to win in the first two sets today, and we didn’t play well after 20,” said Reid. “We made some mistakes and we let our opponent get a little bit of separation, and we couldn’t cut it.”
In the third set, the Bold hit the court in some of their best form of the season. After allowing the opening point, they fought through the Gryphons’ stringent defence with a point to match each of their opponents’.
An injection of life came from second-year outside hitter Darcie Buchanan, who subbed in on the left side for Krahn and went straight to work with her mechanical arm. With the score tied at 6-6, Buchanan led a 5-2 run with four kills. Despite only playing the one set, Buchanan’s six kills in the match were good for third on the Bold, behind only Gingera and Ferguson who each had nine.
“[Buchanan] plays a position where we have a lot of veteran players in key roles playing so there hasn’t always been a ton of opportunity on the left and right. But she’s done well in limited opportunities,” said Reid. “Today, she gave us a huge boost of energy on some points we desperately needed.”
The Bold took a three-point lead into 16-13 and continued climbing with a coordinated effort—kills from Buchanan, Amos-Ross Fisher and Ferguson combined with attack errors from the Gryphons. At the same time, Safar led from the service line—showing her prowess as a setter with well-rounded abilities developed playing beach volleyball—while Gingera and Ferguson joined fourth-year libero Mary Rioflorido in the defensive effort with digs and service receptions.
Nevertheless, the Bold finished with 56 digs to Guelph’s 64. They had fewer digs than their opponents for the seventh time in the last eight games. Reid said his team is not used to this.
“I will just be blunt in saying it’s a bit more about our offence currently than our opponent’s defence. But I give Guelph credit,” he said.
An extended rally ended in the Bold favour off the hand of Buchanan for a 19-14 lead, then an emphatic double block by Safar and Amos-Ross Fisher turned their side of the scoreboard to 20.
From there, however, the end-of-set curse came back. When Vang sent a lightning strike kill down the line to tie the game at 22-22, the Bold called another timeout. They gave up a three-point and a six-point lead in the set, their largest of the game and the latter, of the weekend.
“[Guelph] made a lot of plays at key times,” said Reid. “In that third set, we were in a great position. We didn’t make any mistakes. They just made some digs and hits and all of a sudden the game was tied.”
The teams then traded kills and blocks en route to a deuce, where the Bold’s earlier abilities to put strings of points together disappeared. Amos-Ross Fisher contributed to two blocks down the final stretch but the Bold did not have enough in the tank to extend the match, losing the set 28-26 and the game 3-0.
“We just need to focus on our game more. I think we get a little bit in our heads about the gameplan, overthinking it a little bit,” she said. “We can’t focus on what they’re doing, just taking care of our own points.”
UP NEXT: The Bold head to Robert J. Surtees Student Athletic Centre in North Bay, Ont., to take on the Nipissing Lakers in another double-header weekend. First-serve is set for 6 p.m.
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