Dunstone beats Swiss champ in bronze-medal game

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This article was published 13/03/2016 (3723 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Manitoba’s Matt Dunstone isn’t closing out his junior curling career with a gold medal, but he is leaving on a winning note.

On Sunday, Dunstone and his Team Canada rink of third Colton Lott, second Kyle Doering and lead Rob Gordon finally shook the Swiss monkey off their backs, beating Switzerland champ Yannick Schwaller 8-4 in the world junior championship bronze medal game.

“We went into the game very loose, but as the game went on you start to care a little bit more,” Dunstone said. “Obviously it was not the game we wanted to be in, but I was very proud of how the guys went about their business today.”

Perhaps it was payback. The Swiss beat Canada in the round robin, then blocked their path in Saturday’s 3-vs-4 Page game. That was a tough loss to swallow: Canada was leading until the seventh, when a flubbed Dunstone hit and a slick double from Schwaller opened up a chance for Switzerland to nab three.

After trading singles, the teams shook in the 10th end on a 6-4 final score. “We were outplaying ‘em, for sure,” Dunstone said. “Both losses against them, we kind of gave up one bad end… it summed up our whole week. That one end was just a bit off, and other skips were taking advantage of it.”

Switzerland went on to lose to Team United States skip Korey Dropkin in the semifinal. Scotland’s Bruce Mouat claimed the championship title.

It’s a bittersweet finish for Dunstone, who had skipped a phenomenal campaign in his last year of junior play. His team crushed the Canadian junior field in January, then promptly turned around to knock off Reid Carruthers in the Manitoba men’s semifinal; so they were set to make a splash on the world junior stage.

Once in Denmark for the world junior tournament, Dunstone thought his team struggled to adjust to the quiet atmosphere at Taarnby Curling Club. The event was originally supposed to be hosted in Turkey, but in late January the World Curling Federation announced it would move them to near Copenhagen.

“It was tough going from playing in places like Selkirk and Stratford, and go into a curling club,” Dunstone said. “It felt more like any cash spiel event we had played in. We were starting to get to adjust later in the week, and it just wasn’t early enough. Sadly other teams adjusted better than us.” 

Now, they’re set to arrive back in Winnipeg on Monday night with a bronze medal, instead of the hopeful gold. They have a little bit more curling ahead, with a big opportunity for the skip: next weekend, Dunstone is set to pinch-hit at third for Alberta’s Charley Thomas in the Grand Slam of Curling’s Elite 10 event.

‘Obviously it was not the game we wanted to be in, but I was very proud of how the guys went about their business today’ — Matt Dunstone, on his bronze-medal performance at the world junior curling championship 

After that, the skip said, it’ll be time for a hard-earned spot of rest. And though the bronze may mark the disappointing punctuation on his junior career, his men’s career stretches out bright ahead: as things stand now, Dunstone, Lott, Doering and Gordon intend to keep their group together next season.

“I think our season that we just had would give us a good enough reason to stick around,” Dunstone said. “One off-week doesn’t define what our season consisted of this year. In our minds, we had one of the best seasons any junior team has ever had. To do what we did in the men’s provincials is really something to be proud of.” 

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca