U Sports – TORONTO (U Sports) – The host and No. 2 seed Toronto Varsity Blues notched their first win of the 2016 CIS field hockey championship, defeating the Guelph Gryphons 4-1 in a repeat of the 2016 OUA final on Friday night at Back Campus Fields.

With the win, the Blues improve to 8-5-1 over the Gryphons in all-time meetings at the national tournament.

Toronto, who defeated Guelph 3-2 to claim their third straight OUA banner last Sunday, exacted revenge over their conference counterparts after a 4-2 loss in last year’s national bronze-medal match in Victoria.

Fifth-year Blues forward and 2016 U Sports all-Canadian Alison Lee scored two goals two minutes apart and set up the game-winning goal to seal the U of T victory.

“The second half was huge,” said Lee after the game. “We had a lot more time on the ball and more composure, making sure we were making our usual passes and playing more Varsity Blues hockey. In the first half of both of our games we have been getting away from it but we’ve been able to regroup during halftime to pull ourselves together for the second half.”

Fourth-year Blues forward Lauren Sudac of Burlington, Ont., opened the scoring in the fifth minute, but 2016 U Sports co-player of the year Olivia Lane (Guelph, Ont.) responded in the 34th minute, scoring her tournament-leading third goal, to even the game 1-1 at halftime.

Megan Johansen, a fourth-year Blues forward from Kelowna, B.C., put Toronto ahead in the 38th minute off a nice pass from Lee.

Lee added some insurance for the Blues, scoring off a penalty corner in the 55th minute, and adding her second goal off a penalty stroke two minutes later to round out the win.

“Every time we play against U of T we’re in tight,” said Gryphons head coach Michelle Turley. “I thought we started out the second half really well but we made an error so they scored early in the half. Everyone is playing their hearts out and that’s all we can ask of them and getting a year at the national championship is going to get them lots of experience that they need to go forward for the next few years.”

The Gryphons (0-2-0), who will play for bronze on Sunday, wrap up round robin action tomorrow vs the top-seeded UBC Thunderbirds (1-0-1) tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. The No. 2 Blues (1-1-0) will take on the Canada West silver medalist Victoria Vikes (1-0-1) at 3 p.m. Both games will be streamed live on SportsCanada.TV.

Official championship website: http://english.cis-sic.ca/championships/fh/index

SCORING SUMMARY
TOR: 1-3: 4
GUE: 1-0: 1
 
First half
TOR Lauren Sudac (1), 5th minute
GUE Olivia Lane (3), 34th minute

Second half
TOR Megan Johansen (1), 38th minute
TOR Alison Lee (1), 55th minute
TOR Alison Lee (2), 57th minute
 
Goaltenders
TOR: Elizabeth O’Hara (W, 70:00, 1 GA, 1-1-0)
GUE: Morgan Kelley (L, 70:00, 4 GA, 0-2-0)
          
Players of the game
TOR: Alison Lee (Mississauga, Ont.)
GUE: Ciara Condon (London, Ont.)

STANDINGS, SCHEDULE & RESULTS

Round-robin standings

                        GP       W        L          T         GF       GA      PTS
1. Victoria        2          1          0          1          5          3          4
2. UBC             2          1          0          1          4          3          4
3. Toronto        2          1          1          0          6           4         3
4. Guelph         2          0          2          0          3           8         0

NOTE: 3 points for a win and 1 point for a tie.

Thursday, Nov. 3
16:00 Game 1: Victoria 4, Guelph 2
18:30 Game 2: UBC 3, Toronto 2

Friday, Nov. 4
16:00 Game 3: UBC 1, Victoria 1
18:30 Game 4: Toronto 4, Guelph 1

Saturday, Nov. 5
12:30 Game 5: UBC vs Guelph (SportsCanada.TV)
15:00 Game 6: Toronto vs Victoria (SportsCanada.TV)

Sunday, Nov. 6
12:30 Bronze medal Match (SportsCanada.TV)
15:00 Championship final (SportsCanada.TV)

 

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