Bold wrap up senior night with weekend sweep over Excalibur

The Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) Bold women’s volleyball squad added a straight-set victory to their senior night festivities on Saturday, storming past the Trent Excalibur by scores of 25-14, 25-17, 25-17.

The Bold picked up right where they left off in their 3-1 victory over the Excalibur on Friday, replicating a strong opening set on both ends of the ball to take the first lead of Saturday’s match. 

Featuring Britney Veltman on their front line for just the second time in three months, TMU jumped to a quick 15-5 lead over Trent with their senior middle back into the lineup. 

Although she spent parts of both the second and third set of Saturday’s contest on the bench, the return of TMU’s captain (Briney) instilled life in the arms of several members of the Bold contingent throughout the first set, with none showing more potency than Lauren Veltman. 

“Everyone worked together to try to keep [Britney] on,” mentioned Lauren following the match. “That was just really exciting and fun to watch,” she added.

Opting to take Friday off to rest, Lauren’s form seemed unbothered in the early goings of Saturday’s contest, slamming down six kills on eight attempts to throw the Bold on top of the Excalibur 25-14. 

The Brampton, ON native finished the evening with a team-high 18 kills while adding 11 digs to her industrious perforfmance on Saturday. 

TMU struggled out of the gate in the second set however, falling behind the Excalibur 7-1 but managing to steady the ship en route to their second victory of the evening. 

Trailing the Excalibure 13-12, the Bold rallied off four consecutive points to pull ahead of their opposition and take their first lead of the set. The group later added a 7-0 attacking run to their mix to snatch a 2-0 advantage and push Trent to the brink of a weekend sweep. 

After labeling Friday’s start to TMU’s second set with Trent as ‘immature,’Head Coach of the Bold Dustin Reid seemed far less bothered by his team’s early mulligan on Saturday. 

“To stabilize our game and come back really showed what [our] players were here to do today,” mentioned Reid. 

The Bold clinched their fifth-consecutive victory in the third set after throwing themselves in front of the Excalibur 12-1. 

Holding the visitors to just a 0.23 hitting percentage, the Bold rallied past their opposition with little restraint to finish off their weekend sweep over Trent and extend their unbeaten run over the Oshawa side to fourteen games. 

With their overall record improved to 13-5 on the campaign, the Bold head into the final two games of their regular season with sights set on a weekend sweep against the Guelph Gryphons.

A pair of wins could propel the Bold over the Gryphons in the league standings and secure home-court advantage for the first round of the OUA playoffs. With the current state of the standings, Guelph appears to be the leading favorite as TMU’s first test towards a league title. 

The thought of home-court advantage in the postseason has started to slowly creep in the mind of Reid and his team as a final series with Guelph looms.

“When we meet them Friday, that will be front and centre for us.”

First serve from Guelph is set to fly on Friday at 6:00 p.m.