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Both L.U. teams earn splits as tough home and home matchups await
2025-01-15

The Laurentian Voyageurs men's and women's basketball teams will both be coming off a split on the road last weekend as they return home for very tough weekend homestands at the Ben Avery Gym.

The L.U. women dropped a 69-43 decision to the Queen's Gaels last Friday in Kingston, bouncing back to topple the Ontario Tech Ridgebacks 79-63 the next evening in Oshawa.

The Laurentian men mirrored that effort to some extent, beaten 102-84 by Queen's but climbing back above the .500 mark thanks to a 63-55 victory over Ontario Tech in game two.

With a record of 4-9, the Voyageurs' women remain in a dogfight with the likes of the Nipissing Lakers (4-9), Laurier Golden Hawks (4-8) and York Lions (4-8), looking to chase down perhaps the Waterloo Warriors (6-7).

Laurentian got off to a more than solid start in their opener in the Limestone City, building up a 15-10 first quarter lead over the 10-2 Gaels, the homeside fighting back with a vengeance thanks to a 23-7 second quarter run, holding L.U. to ten points or less in both the second and third quarters.

The Queen's troika of Katrina Renon (15), Brooke Hussey (14) and Mikayla McFarlane (12) did much of the damage offensively for the Gaels, with Sudbury native Bree Bourget chipping in with five points in 16 minutes of play.

Aneisha Rismond enjoyed a monster game coming off the bench for the Voyageurs, her 13 points (in 18 minutes) leaving the Lo-Ellen Park Secondary School graduate as the only double digit scorer for the visiting team.

Facing the Ridgebacks the next night, Laurentian turned to their dynamic duo who starred offensively through much of the first half of the season as Emilie Lafond (24) and Cadence Pecore (22) combined for 46 points in lifting L.U. past Ontario Tech.

No less than 11 players hit the scoresheet for coach Jason Hurley, whose team jumped out to a 44-32 lead at the half and maintained the pressure, outscoring the Ridgebacks in all four quarters of play.

Laurentian controlled the paint nicely, outrebounding Ontario Tech 41- 19 as Emilie Lafond cleaned up with ten rebounds on her own.

Ironically, the Laurentian men also held an advantage over Queen's after ten minutes of play, up 22-20, but could not contain the hard-charging and nationally ranked Gaels (11-1) in quarter two.

Luka Syllas buried 25 points in showing the way for the winning side, with teammates Ollie Engen (16), Isaac Krueger (16), Lucas Ponting (15) and Jalen Sikkema (13) all sharing the ball around nicely.

Countering for Laurentian were Philippe Fandio with 21 points, followed by Nginyu Ngala (17) and Daniel Muila-Mwaka (10) as the Voyageurs bettered the 50% plateau from beyond the arc, hitting on 15 of their 28 three point attempts (53.6%).

A much lower scoring encounter the next evening would see two different faces surge to the top of the L.U. scoring parade as Ismael Konate (13) and Shawn Barthelemy (12) found themselves just a few points clear of the eight/nine point crowd of teammates (Kamil Dia Hantchi, Nginyu Ngala, Chikosi Boardi).

A quick start again was part of the M.O. for the Laurentian men, up 20-9 after Q1 and leading pretty much from start to finish in bumping their record up to 7-6 with a key victory against a 6-6 opponent.

That is not exactly what awaits both the Laurentian men and women this weekend as the Ottawa Gee Gees pay a visit to Sudbury on Friday night, with both of their teams sporting 11-2 marks, while the Carleton Ravens women (13-0) and men (10-3) follow suit Saturday night on the campus of Laurentian University.

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