A breakthrough performance from Danika Mayer and a very good showing right across the board provided the Collège Boréal Vipères badminton crew plenty of reason to smile at the Centennial Colts Invitational Tournament earlier this month in Toronto.

Mayer advanced all the way through to the quarter-finals in women's single play before she was eliminated by top seed and eventual gold medal winner Anh Hoang of George Brown (7-21, 8-21).

Prior to that, Mayer had defeated Lorenza Renna of Conestoga (21-17, 21-17), Julia Jones of Mohawk (21-12, 21-11) and Arisa Nomura of Georgian (17-21, 21-16, 21-16).

Also reaching the quarter-finals of championship flight were the doubles team of Lynn Michel and Emilie Roy, knocking off the Conestoga duo of Lorenza Renna and Amanda Hutchings (21-3, 21-2) and Han Pham and Melanie Wade of Fanshawe (21-13, 21-16), before encountering the #3 seed of former Vipères Michelle Kozlowskyj and Courtney Brewer of Georgian (21-19, 16-21, 19-21).

Emilie Roy also bounced back nicely in singles play, following a tough round two draw opposite #3 Kate Huang of UTM (11-21, 22-20, 13-21), working her way through to the consolation semi-final with victories over Emily Postma of St Lawrence (21-9, 21-6), Pardis Jafariahamizadeh of George Brown (21-13, 21-9) and Sophia Yu of Centennial (21-12, 21-11), succumbing to silver medal winner Jessica Maher of Georgian (11-21, 24-22, 15-21).

Victories were a little tougher to come by on the men's side of the draw, as only Jon Boucher and Zackary Brunet got the better of Shubham Dyal Singh (Georgian) and Gabriel Nadeau (St Lawrence) in doubles play (21-13, 21-9), with Luc Demers (Boréal) and Evan Lam (Humber) eliminated in two straight.

All three Boréal men also competed in singles play. The entire team will now get ready for the OCAA East Regionals on February 1st and 2nd at George Brown College in Toronto, with the top three in every category moving on to provincials on February 15th and 16th at the University of Toronto - Mississauga.