National Championships Underway In Town

Nugget Column #07 – Tuesday November 11th, 2014

The Canadian Mixed Curling Championships commenced yesterday at the North Bay Granite Club where fourteen teams representing every province and territory are vying for the opportunity to represent Canada at the first ever World Mixed Curling Championships to be held in September 2015.

New Brunswick, Northwest Territories, Ontario and Northern Ontario got off to a good start Monday morning adding points to the win column from the get go.

As this article is written the second draw is finishing up in time to welcome our sponsors, media and dignitaries for the official Opening Ceremonies.

Danny Lamoureux of the Canadian Curling Association summarizes Draw 1 action and tells us about what can be expected at the conclusion of round robin play:

The Northwest Territories foursome of Koe, Kerry Galusha, Robert Borden and Megan Cormier scored two points in the first and third ends and were in a great position to maybe finish the game in the sixth, until Manitoba’s Kolomaya made a raise double takeout stealing a point when Koe missed his last shot. Another Manitoba steal in the seventh end made the score 6-5 for Koe with the NWT holding last stone advantage. In the final end, Kolomaya placed his last stone behind a corner guard forcing Koe to draw at minimum the full eight foot, which he easily accomplished.

In Pool B action, local favourite Colin Koivula and this Thunder Bay team of Oye-Sem Won, Chris Briand and Amanda Gates defeated Gary Oke of Corner Brook, NL 7-4. Koivula sits at 1-0 with fellow Ontarian Chris Gardner of the Ottawa CC. Gardner stole nine consecutive points in stopping Nunavut’s Wade Kingdon 9-1 in only six ends.

At the conclusion of the round robin, the top four teams in each pool advance to the championship round, with the teams playing the teams from the opposite pool, carrying forward their win-loss records for only those games involving the advancing teams.

Meanwhile, the bottom three teams in each pool will go to the Seeding Pool, where they will compete against the three teams from the opposite pool. The teams carry forward their win-loss record only from the games involving the other two teams in their round-robin pool. This will determine seedings for the 2016 Canadian Mixed in Toronto.

At the conclusion of the championship round on Friday, two semifinals will take place on Saturday morning at 9:30 a.m. ET, pitting 1 vs 4 and 2 vs 3. The two winners then advance to the final Saturday afternoon at 2:30 p.m. while the two losing teams meet in the bronze-medal game at the same time.

In addition, all games throughout the competition are now eight (not 10) ends. Also, no tiebreaker games will be played at the conclusion of either round. Instead, any ties for position will be determined by accumulated pre-game Last-Shot-Draw results.

Play continues week-long with draw times at 9:30am, 2:00pm and 6:30pm. Cost is $10/person/day while final day passes will go for $15 on Saturday November 15th.

Entertainment has been arranged for every night of the week and the public is encouraged to take part. Tonight will see Jim Harney and Peter Cliché take the stage while Wednesday will feature an array of local talents including the Trinity Church Choir; Thursday will welcome the Brian Risk Band and Friday – Night Ryder.

Bobby Ray General Manager North Bay Granite Club