Montford crew claims berth

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 15/11/2011 (5325 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

They provided one of the most interesting stories of the 2011 Manitoba Scotties Tournament of Hearts last February — and they didn’t even make the playoffs.

And so it will be even more interesting to see what Winnipeg’s Michelle Montford and her young foursome can do at the 2012 provincial women’s curling championship now that they have punched their ticket to return.

Montford earned her 2012 Scotties berth at Assiniboine-Memorial Curling Club — her home club — with an 11-5 victory over East. St Paul’s Kim Link in one of two Scotties berth bonspiel finals played on Monday.

In the other berth final, Fort Rouge’s Barb Spencer defeated clubmate — and sister — Darcy Robertson 5-2.

With the victories, Spencer and Montford join defending champion Cathy Overton-Clapham and 2010-11 CTRS points leader Jennifer Jones as the four teams already qualified for the 16-team 2012 Scotties, set to be played Jan. 25-29 in Portage la Prairie.

Montford, 23 — supported by third Courtney Blanchard, second Sara Jones and lead Sarah Norget — made waves at the 2011 Scotties in what was the first appearance at the women’s provincials for all four women.

Unheralded coming into the week, the foursome put together a nice run and had a chance to force a playoff tiebreaker game with a victory in their final round-robin game but came up short and finished at 4-3, just out of the playoffs.

Back for more with the same team this winter, Montford said her rink has spent this winter curling a modest schedule on the Manitoba Curling Tour and had pointed their season towards playing again in the provincials — something they’ve now achieved. “It really takes a lot of pressure off the rest of the season,” said Montford, “and we’re really excited about going back.”

The two-berth Scotties berth bonspiel this year is part of a revamped qualifying system for the Manitoba women’s curling championship that has also seen the zone playdowns system realigned.

Eleven additional Scotties berths will be determined next month in those playdowns, with the 12th and final berth to go to the highest ranked eligible team on the Manitoba Curling Tour this winter.

In other curling on Monday, defending world-champion second Reid Carruthers stepped out on Jeff Stoughton over the weekend to skip half of David Bohn’s team to a win in the $44,000 White’s Drug Store Classic in Swan River.

With the Stoughton team taking the weekend off and Bohn unavailable, Carruthers piloted Bohn third Andrew Irving and second Dennis Bohn, along with Corey Chambers from Sean Grassie’s men’s squad, to a 6-3 win over Saskatoon’s Colton Flasch in the final.

The foursome went undefeated in Swan River, earning $10,000 with the win, Carruthers also picked up bragging rights for the rest of the winter on his Stoughton teammates.

Or maybe not. “Quote me as saying,” Stoughton lead Steve Gould quipped via text message last night, “that he’s a much better skip than a second.”

Meanwhile, in Sudbury at the Canadian Mixed on Monday, Grassie and the rest of his Manitoba mixed team had mixed results, defeating previously unbeaten New Brunswick on the morning draw and Ontario’s Mark Homan on the afternoon draw, but then losing 7-6 in an extra end to B.C.’s Doug Marshall at night to cap a gruelling three-game day.

Manitoba heads into today with a 5-2 record, tied for fourth place with Quebec’s Martin Ferland. The top three teams at the end of this week advance to the playoffs.

 

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca