Manitoba rinks eye national berths

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This article was published 04/01/2017 (3494 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Don’t worry, be happy.

Easier said than done when huge chunks of time, energy and emotion are expended on curling, the sport they love.

But Hayden Forrester and his teammates from Fort Rouge are maintaining that mindset as they attempt to climb to greater heights at the Manitoba junior men’s championship this week.

So far, the attitude adjustment is paying dividends.

The Forrester foursome has posted six straight victories to secure a spot in the playoffs, and still has one game to play today for a chance to finish the round-robin undefeated in the eight-team Red division.

Forrester is joined on the championship’s third-ranked team by third Brennan Sampson, second Brett MacDonald and lead Cole Chandler. They’ve been together for five years and this is their third straight appearance at the provincial juniors.

Forrester, 19, said failing to quality for the playoffs last year — after making the final four in 2015 — proved to be a pivotal point for the squad.

“We went 4-3 and were kind of disappointed. But what we learned is not putting these big expectations on ourselves. We’re playing a little looser than ever before,” he said Wednesday after a win at the St. Vital Curling Club. “We’re getting back to having more fun with curling, enjoying curling again, instead of every game is do or die, and that seems to be working. It’s a much better attitude to have.”

Forrester prevailed in a nail-biter Wednesday morning, defeating Weston Oryniak of the Granite 9-8, and then coasted to a 7-2 triumph over Jordan Peters of Morris, cracking a three-ender in the fifth.

“We had a couple of corner guards up and finally got our draw weight, that’s always a big one,” he said. “Jordan missed his last one. He came up light and I just had a wide-open draw for three. We play pretty well when we’re up, so when you get a miss you have to capitalize. We’re a pretty good hitting team, so with a lead like that we usually hang on.”

Forrester faces second-ranked J.T. Ryan of Assiniboine Memorial today at 8:30 a.m. at the Pembina Curling Club. Ryan, too, is 6-0 in the Red division and has a spot in the Page playoffs, however, the matchup offers up a dandy bonus prize to the winner — a spot in the 1 vs. 1 game against the top team from the Black division.

Ryan, with Jacques Gauthier at third, Graham McFarlane at second and Brendan Bilawka at lead, knocked off Peters 7-2 in the morning and then downed Oryniak 11-5 in a late-afternoon battle.

In the Black division, fourth-ranked Jordan Smith of Pembina ran his record to 6-0 with a 10-3 win over Brett Walter of Fort Rouge in the late draw and earned a spot in the playoffs. Top-seed Braden Calvert of the Granite lost 5-3 to Brandon Radford and is now 5-1 with one game to go — a battle today against Smith. Radford is 4-2.

Two teams from each division make the Page playoffs.

Meanwhile, Kristy Watling of East St. Paul posted back-to-back victories Wednesday — a 6-3 win over Rebecca Lamb of Stonewall and a 6-1 decision over Elmwood’s Meghan Walter — to improve to 6-0 in the Red division and qualify for the playoff round of the junior women’s championship.

The Watling foursome, with Jenna Boisvert at third, Ashley Groff at second and lead Jenny Greig, is the event’s second seed after a terrific season on the bonspiel circuit, including a win in Brandon at the 2016 Sun Life Financial Junior Challenge in mid-November.

The skip, in her sixth year of junior, was the top seed a year ago in provincials but bowed out in the 2 vs. 2 game. Watling, in her final year of junior eligibility, said Wednesday she’s more determined than ever to get the job done.

“We’re in it to win it,” said the 21-year-old University of Manitoba student, who is studying nutrition. “Ever since the first game, we’ve just kept building and that’s the whole process of it. We’re taking one shot at time, one game at a time… The entire year has been building to this moment and so it’s great to come out and play the way we need to out there.”

Laura Burtnyk’s crew of third Hailey Ryan, second Sara Oliver and lead Rebecca Cormier from Assiniboine Memorial stole a point in the extra end to slip past Lamb 8-7 to improve to 5-1 and earn the second playoff spot in the Red division.

Watling and Burtnyk collide this morning in the final round-robin game, with the winner grabbing a place in the 1 vs. 1 game against the top team in the Black division.

In the Black division, Brooke Friesen of Winkler upended previously undefeated MacKenzie Zacharias of Altona 9-5 in the late draw, and now both teams have identical 5-1 records heading into the final day of round-robin play. Paige Watkins of Deer Lodge and Serena Gray-Withers of Springfield both have 4-2 records.

Manitoba’s two representatives qualify for the Canadian junior men’s and women’s championships Jan. 21-29 in Victoria.

jason.bell@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @WFPJasonBell