OTTAWA, ON – When players, coaches and fans of the Gryphons women's basketball team look back on the 2015-16 season, they will do with several fond memories. For the first time in nearly a decade, the team posted a winning record, qualified for the playoffs and won a postseason game on home court. But on Saturday night in the nation's captial, the Gryphons memorable 2015-16 campaign officially came to an end with a 55-43 OUA Quarterfinal loss to the No. 6-ranked team in the country in the Ottawa Gee-Gees.
 
After defeating Brock in the OUA's Preliminary Round, the Gryphons made the trek to Ottawa to face the No. 1-seed in the OUA in the Gee-Gees, with a spot in the OUA Final Four on the line. During the regular season, the Gee-Gees posted an impressive 17-2 record (best in the OUA) but faced one of their toughest tests of the regular season when they matched up against the Gryphons. Back in October in the lone regular season meeting between these two teams, the Gee-Gees escaped the W.F. Mitchell Centre with a slim 3-point victory (winning 72-69). Saturday night on Ottawa's court, the Gryphons were perhaps battling some early nerves as they struggled offensively and found themselves trailing 8-2 after a low scoring opening quarter of play. While taking down the top seed in the OUA on their court was always going to be a difficult task for the visiting Gryphons, that task became even more challenging when the Gryphs were forced to play almost the entire half without fifth year standout forward Kate MacTavish.
 
Early in the first quarter, MacTavish was forced to leave the game and head to the locker room for repairs after she was cut open by an elbow to the eye. With their OUA All-Star out of commission, the Gryphons struggled to put points on the board and found themselves trailing 24-11 at the half. In the second half, MacTavish returned to the floor. And the Gryphons returned to playing up to their potential.
 
MacTavish showed tremendous leadership and character by pouring in 14 second half points on an efficient 6-of-9 shooting to cap off a memorable five year career with an equally memorable performance. Second year point guard Bridget Atkinson seemed to be summoning her inner Kate MacTavish by hauling in 10 rebounds in the game, 8 of which came in the second half, as the Gryphons were back to playing inspired basketball following a slow start. After scoring just 11 points in the opening half, the Gryphons racked up 17 points in the third quarter alone and trailed by 10 heading to the fourth.
 
However, the top-seeded Gee-Gees were able to knock down some shots early in the fourth quarter and never really allowed the Gryphons to close the gap as they would hold on for the 55-43 victory. MacTavish led the Gryphons with a team-high 14 points while fellow senior Dana Van Balkom filled up the stat sheet with 12 points, 8 rebounds and 4 steals. After the game, Gryphons head coach Christin Dickenson had high praise for her team, "At the start of the season we set the goal of 'changing the story' around this program, and by making it back into the playoffs and reaching the 'quarters, we feel like we did that on a few different levels."
 
Dickenson, who is in her third year as head coach of the Gryphons, would go on to add, "We got off to a slow start tonight, but in the second half really proved that we can play with the best this conference has to offer. While it wasn't the result we wanted today, we still have plenty of positives to take away. I'm just proud of this team, especially the five seniors who gave so much to this program."

Saturday's game marked the final games in the careers of seniors Kate MacTavish, Dana Van Balkom, Barbra Inrig-Pieterse, Vanessa Rampado and Kate Yallin.