Dayna Wahl and her team, playing at home in Altona, and Jace Freeman’s Virden team have won CurlManitoba’s Asham U18 Championships.
The same two teams had, in November, also won CurlManitoba’s Canada Games Trials.
Seeded #1 by the other teams before the event, Freeman’s team (Elias Huminicki, Jack Steski, Rylan Graham, Coach Graham Freeman) posted a 5W-1L record in the preliminary round robin, losing only to Colton Olafson’s Portage team. Their first place finish earned the Virden team a bye to the final game in the three-team playoff.
Team Ronan Peterson (Heather) and Team Zach Norris (Morris) finished the round robin with identical 4W-2L records. Peterson posted a 6-2 win in their semi-final game to advance to the final against Freeman.
Team Freeman stole a pair in the fourth end of the final game and led 4-1 at the mid-game break. Peterson scored two deuces in the second half of the game including a two on the eighth end to force an extra end. Team Freeman controlled the extra end with an early stone biting the four foot counting the winning point without having to throw the last stone.
On the Women’s side, Team Grace Beaudry (St Vital) had an unbeaten 4W-0L record to finish first in their pool with Karys Buchalter and her West St. Paul team in second place with a 3W-1L record. In the other pool, Team Wahl, Shaela Hayward’s Carman team, and Dauphin’s Team Benson (skipped by Cloe Haluschak) shared first place with identical 3W-1L records. Team Wahl was awarded first place and Team Benson was eliminated based on the pre-game draws to the button tiebreaker formula.
Team Beaudry got their first loss of the event in the Page Playoff 1 vs 1 game, a 7-6 extra end win by Team Wahl. In the Page 2 vs 2 game, Team Hayward eliminated Team Buchalter with a 4-2 win, setting up a Beaudry-Hayward semi-final which was also an extra end game. This one was won 7-5 by Team Beaudry.
The Wahl-Beaudry re-match had Team Beaudry leading 2-1 after two ends. Patiently, Team Wahl blanked the next three, looking for their opportunity to score more than a single point. It came on the sixth end when they were able to set up the end for a possible four. An attempted ‘split’ on a rock about an inch off the rings didn’t work but the delivered stone stopped in the back of the eight foot circle for a three and a 4-2 lead.
With an empty house on the seventh end, Team Beaudry elected to use last stone to take a point in hopes of stealing on the home end. However, Dayna Wahl’s eighth end last rock hit, facing a pair, was on target for a 5-3 victory.
As Manitoba has two entries in both the national Men’s & Women’s U-18 championship thanks to the performance of past teams at the national event, all four finalist teams will travel to the nationals in Timmins, ON in early February. The Wahl and Freeman teams will compete as Manitoba champions while the Beaudry and Peterson teams will compete as Manitoba #2.
With a week off between events, the Freeman and Wahl Teams will also represent Manitoba at the Canada Winter Games in Summerside, PEI.
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