While they fell short in the end, the Nipissing Lakers women's volleyball team certainly went out with a bang.

The Lakers dropped their regular season finale in four sets, 3-1, to the Ryerson Rams Sunday at the RJS Athletic Centre, but they made the OUA's top team sweat and work for it.

Ryerson, who finished the season undefeated, ended the year having lost 11 sets – the Lakers took two of those sets in their meetings this season.

The first set was a battle from beginning to end.

Both teams had leads, both teams fought back and both had some incredible plays, but in the end, the Lakers erased a 22-20 deficit to earn a 29-27 victory and grab the lead in the match.

In the second, Nipissing had control early and led at the technical timeout, but Ryerson poured it on late.

The Rams scored the final three points of the match to come away with a 25-22 victory and evened the match up 1-1.

Another even set saw Ryerson score a few points in a row to grab the lead at the technical timeout, as they were up 16-15.

The teams were even 19-19 late in the set, but from there, Ryerson took over and outscored the Lakers 6-2 down the stretch to go up 2-1.

Unfortunately for the Lakers, they seemed to run out of gas, as the Rams took over in the fourth set, looking to complete the comeback.

Ryerson led 10-1 early and 16-5 at the technical timeout and despite a better push in the second half of the set, the Lakers were unable to close the gap.

The Rams took the final set 25-15 and the match 3-1

Leading the way offensively today was Shayla Kessler with 12 kills and 15 points, Erika Lapierre had 13 kills and 14 points and Annabelle Harvey had 5 kills and 10 points.

The Lakers wrapped up the season with a record of 8-11.