The women’s basketball team grabbed the opportunity to send their playoff-bound peers a message last Friday evening in front of 287 rabid fans.

The message came in the form of a regular season-ending 88-78 victory over the Queen’s Golden Gaels.

It served to notify other OUA playoff teams that it will take one heck of an effort to beat the Blues in the Athletic Centre’s Sports Gym at next weekend’s OUA championships (February 28-March 2). The triumph brought their regular season home record to a perfect 10-0.

The visitors cut a 22-point halftime deficit down to seven in the first five minutes of the second half, when Queen’s Jennifer Jackson (27 points) started heating up, bringing the score to 59-52 with 14:10 left.

The Gaels (12-8, 3rd OUA East) got as close as three points when Jackson scored four points in a 7-0 run to close it to 61-58 with 11:46 left. Toronto, who handed first-place Laurentian their first loss of the season last Saturday, was led by Holly Pagnan (28 points, 8 rebounds) and Vanessa Richardson (21 points, 9 rebounds). The Blues enjoyed an overall 43-31 rebounding advantage over the Gaels and were an efficient 29 of 35 (83 percent) from the free throw line.

Jacquie Armour (8 points, 6 rebounds), Vanessa Nobrega (10 points, 4 rebounds) and Paula Romkey (10 points, 8 rebounds) also provided strong efforts for U of T.

The Blues (16-4, 2nd OUA East) started the game hot with Nobrega hitting two three-pointers to open up an early 10-2 lead.

The Gaels battled back to cut the lead down to four on several occasions before U of T ended the half on a 31-11 run, giving them a 58-36 advantage at the midway point.

Playoff action starts this Thursday night at 6 p.m. when the same teams square off in an Ontario University Athletics East semifinal. Laurentian (17-3, 1st OUA East) will play Ryerson (11-9, 4th OUA East) in the other semifinal.

The Lady Voyageurs followed up a string of 17 consecutive wins to start the season with a regular season ending three-game losing streak (Toronto, Queen’s and York).

Toronto can guarantee themselves a berth at Nationals (@McMaster, March 7-10) if they win the OUA championship.

Following the game was the biggest surprise of the night, as reserve forward Catherine Chorney accepted a marriage proposal from her boyfriend during a ceremony honoring graduating players (Chorney, Richardson and Pagnan).

Photograph by Simon Turnbull