By Kyla Pugen

In 2022, Riley Donovan packed his life into suitcases and made the 16,000-kilometre journey from Sydney, Australia to Toronto, Canada. Though he says the memory feels like a lifetime ago now, he hasn’t forgotten the nerves of moving far from home when he was just 18 years old.

“It was pretty daunting coming to a new country where I didn’t really have any family or any friends,” said Donovan, who is now in his fifth year at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU).

As the Bold men’s volleyball team captain, Donovan is looking back on the younger version of himself who first arrived in Toronto and all he’s achieved since then.

“I’d like to think he’d be proud of the life that I’ve built here,” said Donovan.

Throughout his time with the Bold, Donovan has excelled on the court. Last season, he played in 20 matches, appearing in 74 sets. He averaged a .217 hitting percentage, logged 198 kills and 89 digs and accounted for 228 points. In March, Donovan earned Ontario University Athletics (OUA) Third-Team All-Star honours. But as preseason concludes this Friday, Donovan will begin his fifth and final year with the team.

When the Aussie began envisioning what the next chapter after high school would look like, he discovered TMU men’s volleyball head coach, Niko Rukavina. Unlike conventional recruiting, the two had never met in person on the court and many of their earliest conversations took place over Zoom from opposite ends of the world. But despite the distance, Rukavina saw something in Donovan’s character. 

“I picked up on his family dynamic and his relationship with his brothers and his parents, and right away we knew he was a good person. That is something that we look at when we’re recruiting,” said Rukavina. 

“It’s not just about potential. He came from a good family. He had a good heart and a good mind and someone that I think would have added to our culture,” he added.

When asked about his relationship with his coach, Donovan couldn’t pinpoint a singular moment that defined their bond; instead, he spoke to all the consistent commitments Rukavina made to nurture their partnership over time.

“I kind of think about us having our weekly chats,” said Donovan.

“He’s quite similar to me in a lot of the ways that he thinks and approaches different situations. I think he’s a role model for me later on. He’s got an awesome family

and kids, and has gone through a lot of life experiences and lessons. [He’s] a very open-minded guy that wants to get better and wants to learn.”

Another of Donovan’s closest bonds is fourth-year setter Evan Moua, who joined TMU in the same recruiting class as Donovan back in 2022. Soon, the two would find themselves living together and even sharing Thanksgivings for the past four years, a tradition the Aussie had never celebrated back home.

Moua describes Donovan as a ‘glue guy’—someone finely attuned to those around him and a presence that anchors the team.

“He knows when to keep it real with you,” said Moua. “But he also knows when to check in on you. If you’re not doing so well on an off day, he can tell.” 

Fourth-year setter Declan Dunn, another close friend and teammate of Donovan, said the same.

“He always kind of knew where the perfect middle point of our attitude and our energy levels were,” said Dunn. “He’s a mature guy for us, and he does a really good job of keeping everyone else accountable, and that includes himself.”

Back in Canberra, Kiefer Sinclair, one of Donovan’s former teammates and now a fourth-year setter at Lakeland College in Alberta, shared the courts with him at the Australian Institute of Sport just a year before he moved to Toronto. Even back then, Sinclair said Donovan’s level-headed attitude was evident. 

He also said when the pair were younger, they used to talk about the importance of taking the “high road” for many aspects of life, both on and off the court.

“It doesn’t matter if I’m right or wrong, but let’s just take the high road and do the right thing, and it’ll resolve itself later.” 

Throughout the past four years, Donovan’s journey has taken him up and down many roads, and at the end of the 2026-27 season, he’ll step away from a team that has become an integral part of structure and familiarity in his life. 

“I’m not going to be hanging out with 17, 18 of my best friends every single day, so that’ll be a struggle for sure. But it’ll be exciting. It’ll be a new chapter, and I feel like I’ll be ready to move on,” Donovan said. 

Though his future plans aren’t entirely decided yet, Donovan’s commitments to himself and those around him are clear.

“I want to be known as a good brother, a good son, a good friend, a good boyfriend,” he said. “That’s what I want to be known as at the end of the day.”

Donovan loves volleyball, and his achievements are a big part of his identity, but he’s come to realize there’s more to life than his sport.

During his time with the Bold, the team hasn’t captured a banner. Yet, along with the program, he has gained more than just records.

“Five years of memories and experiences, the good, the bad, you learn to love it all,” said Donovan. “Some of the best people I’ll probably ever meet, I’ll hold them very dearly for the rest of my life.”

For Rukavina, Donovan’s legacy lives on in his mentorship and the care he’s imparted to the players who will soon lead the team after he graduates. Even throughout periods of injury and losses, Donovan’s commitment and focus to the team always remained a steady constant.

“He’s just been a great leader and a voice for us. As the first years get younger and he gets older, I see more and more of him in the way he supports the younger players, the way he’s there for them. Riley has his own life as an older player. He has his own community and his own way of doing things. But to be able to turn it all off or shut it all down, to be able to step up for a younger player or anybody on our team is a huge example of that,” said Rukavina.

Donovan hopes to keep playing volleyball, in whatever capacity that may be. Always looking for new experiences and opportunities to challenge himself personally and physically, he’s considering pursuing a master’s degree in England while playing on a university team or joining a league in Europe.

Rukavina plans to help his player navigate agent connections and overseas opportunities over the winter break, helping Donovan begin writing the next chapter of his life, much like he did when the two first met.