The Windsor Lancers women's volleyball team traveled to Toronto Sunday afternoon where they dropped a 3-1 (25-21, 19-25. 18-25, 15-25) to the host Varsity Blues at the Goldring Centre.
 
The loss was the Lancers first since their opening match of 2020, and leaves them in a three way tie for fourth place in the OUA west division with an 8-7 record.   
 
GAME STATS
The Lancers were led by the strong play of first year outside hitter Yaila Sealy who had the most offensive output for her team tallying 16 kills on the afternoon for the blue and gold. Ally Winik also had an effective offensive game totalling 9 kills for her squad. 
 
Lexi Pollard also had a good afternoon of offense with 7 kills of her own to claim. Both Winik and Pollard also recorded 3 service aces each in the game. Setter Brooke Davis had 29 assists in the loss while Amie Slawson once again led the way defensively with a whopping 23 digs on the afternoon tilt at the Goldring Centre in downtown Toronto. 
 
GAME FLOW
To open the game, the visiting Lancers proved to match up well with the host Varsity Blues, trading points early on and often holding the lead throughout the set. The Lancers managed to beat the Varsity Blues to the technical timeout holding a slim 16-14 lead while sustaining solid play despite the Varsity Blues looking to go on a run late in the set. The Lancers closed out the first with a 25-21 win to go up 1-0 in the match. 
 
In the second set, the Varsity Blues came out strong on the attack early looking to bounce back from dropping the first set to the Lancers. However, Toronto kept their poise leading them to first crack the technical timeout with a 16-13 lead going into the break. In the end though, the Blues would have enough juice to close out the second set by a score 25-19 and tie up the match at 1-1 to head into the third set and extending the match by granting guaranteed extra set to be played later in the match. 
 
The Varsity Blues continued to assert their dominance on their home floor in the third, doing all they can to not drop another set to the visiting Lancers. They once again started off strong posting a 5-1 lead forcing Windsor to call a timeout to try and weather the early storm sent their way. Toronto would also reach the technical timeout again first having earned a 16-13 advantage at the break. Despite the Lancers putting forth a strong effort in the later stages of the set, the heavy offensive production generated by the Blues was too much to handle as they were able to snatch up the third set with a 25-18 and go up 2-1 in the match. 
 
In the fourth set, the Blues came firing on all cylinders again out of the gate. They showed the blue and gold why they have been undefeated at home all season to date.  They managed to continue that home excellence tradition by finishing off the blue and gold by a score of 25-18 snapping the Lancer ladies five game winning streak heading into today's contest. 
 
UP NEXT
The Lancers will now head home and will prepare to take on the Western Mustangs on Saturday afternoon, February 8th from the Dennis Fairall Fieldhouse located inside the St. Denis Centre.  First serve is scheduled for 12:00pm.
 
The day is also the Lancers annual Breast Cancer Awareness Day and they will once again be selling commemorative t-shirts and accepting donations to help raise awareness and funds for breast cancer research.