Randy Neufeld and his LaSalle team (Peter Nicholls, Darren Oryniak, Dale Michie) have won CurlManitoba’s Manitoba’s Credit Unions Master Men’s championship with a 4-3 win over Mike Mahon and his Granite CC team.
The win for the LaSalle team mirrors the accomplishment of Laurie Deprez and her LaSalle team who won the Master Women’s championship Sunday. It is the first time in the Manitoba’s Credit Unions sponsorship years that the two championships have been won by teams from the same club.
The Neufeld foursome was the top seed coming into the event and will have a chance to win a second Manitoba title in two weeks time when they compete as the defending champion in CurlManitoba’s Strathcona Trust Seniors in Dauphin (with Dean Moxham replacing Oryniak).
The championship gives Nicholls, who won the 1994 Labatt Tankard in Thompson with Dave Smith, his seventh Manitoba “buffalo” championship crest as he also won the 2018 Manitoba Mixed to go with four Manitoba Senior Men’s.
Neufeld, Nicholls and Michie won the 2015, 2016, 2021, and 2022 Manitoba Senior Men’s titles. Michie also won the Manitoba Mixed in 2001. Oryniak is also a former Manitoba champion, having won the 2013 Manitoba Senior Men’s championship.
Randy Neufeld and his team had reached the final undefeated in the seven game round robin, to finish atop the Asham pool, and with a 7-5 victory over Team Mahon in the Page 1 vs 1 playoff game.
Mike Mahon (Bill Menzies, Blair Smith, Larry Borus) posted a 6W-1L record in round robin play to top the Asham Express pool. They had eliminated defending champion Murray Warren (Brandon) in the Monday morning semi-final when they won a last end measure and a steal to win 4-2. The Warren team had beaten Allan Gitzel (Miami) 6-4 in the Saturday evening Page 3 vs game.
Gord Mackay (Pembina) and Ray Baker (Dauphin) had also advanced past the round-robin stage but were eliminated in the first round of playoffs by Gitzel and Warren respectively.
