New West’s best came a few rocks short from earning a world tour.
The Sarah Daniels rink fell 9-5 to Nova Scotia’s team in last week’s 2016 Canadian junior women’s curling championship final in Stratford, Ont.
A clutch eighth-end draw by skip Mary Fay put the brakes to Team B.C.’s comeback attempt, catapulting Nova Scotia to its fourth Canadian junior women’s title, and first since 2004.
Daniels’ rink, rooted at the Royal City Curling Club, also features third Marika Van Osch, second Dezaray Hawes, lead Megan Daniels and coach Katie Witt.
In the fifth end B.C. pulled even on a single point, then stole singles in the sixth and seventh ends. But a clever takeout by Nova Scotia in the eighth cleared a path for Fay to clinch it.
The Maritimers added a pair in the ninth, with B.C. running out of rocks in the 10th end.
“We’re all really proud of each other,” said Sarah Daniels, 16, in a press release. “I know there will be tears because it sucks to lose, but we’re really happy for Mary’s team because they’ve worked so hard, and they’ve waited for this for so long.
“We’re just going to take away everything we can from this. We’ve learned so much from this competition, and we’ll push harder to get better next year.”
The team’s coach beamed with pride at the foursome’s accomplishment in the national spotlight.
“Bringing home a medal of any colour at the national level is a huge accomplishment,” Witt told the Record. “Of course, we would have liked to perform better in the final. Our strength shows up when we get up on the scoreboard and unfortunately, we couldn’t shift into our comfort zone.”
The rink, which wrapped up the round robin with an 8-2 record, became very comfortable together over the season as the girls grew into their roles, said Witt.
“We have Megan to set up the end and then rely on Dez and Marika to clear the way for a move at Sarah’s rocks,” said Witt. “There are very few teams who can match our peeling ability. Unfortunately, we had too many misses finishing the end.”
Both Sarah Daniels and Van Osch were named to the tournament’s first all-star team.
Nova Scotia's Karlee Burgess and Fay will join Royal City/Langley's Tyler Tardi and Fort St. John's Sterling Middleton to represent Canada in mixed curling at next month’s Youth Winter Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway; the Scotia quartet will also wear the Maple Leaf at the World Junior curling championships, March 5 to 13 in Denmark.
The Royal City and Langley-based club’s Tardi rink came nearly as close to winning it all at the junior boys nationals, getting bumped in the semifinal 8-3 by eventual champion Matt Dunstone from Manitoba.
The team, which includes skip Tyler Tardi, third Daniel Wenzek, second Jordan Tardi and lead Nick Meister, returned home with the bronze.
In their battle with Manitoba, a 5-4 extra-end loss in the round robin provided some good insight on what B.C. needed to do – and the semifinal had a promising start.
“We had taken them to extra ends (in the round robin) and got an early jump by stealing a point in the first end,” recalled Wenzek. “That was a boost of confidence but we couldn’t keep it going.”
Manitoba tied it in the second, B.C. again replied with a point and 2-1 advantage after three ends, but the prairie team corralled its momentum with two in the fourth and another two over the next two ends.
“With (Dunstone’s) terrific hitting, anytime you left them a double to hit, they hit it,” remarked coach Paul Tardi.
Manitoba finished the semifinal by shooting 91 per cent, an incredible score, while the Tardi rink posted a steady 77 per cent.
Wenzek, a Burnaby native and RCCC member, said the whole experience of bonding with a new team was incredible this past season.
As the lone curler who had competed at the junior nationals before – he was third for the Rene Comeau’s New Brunswick team that finished second in 2014 – the event was something everyone was focused on.
“This was probably the strongest teams they had (at the junior men’s championships),” he noted. “I knew what the environment and conditions were like and we talked about how to handle our emotions… This was just a great season, we had a good team and everyone got along.”
The B.C. rink finished the round robin with a 7-3 record.
On the prize front, Wenzek joined Team B.C. girls’ Hawes in picking up a FairPlay award for their efforts at the tournament.
Wenzek ages out of junior competition, but the Tardi rink still has the B.C. men’s championships to play next week in Nelson. Wenzek will slide in as skip for that event.
