Granite rink sees struggles against Swan River as reality check

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This article was published 04/01/2019 (2807 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In a simpler world, skip Serena Gray-Withers and her No. 2-seeded team from the Granite would have zipped through Day 2 at the Canola Junior Championship unbeaten and on a roll.

As it happened, Presley Sagert got in the way of those best-laid plans. Sagert’s young Swan River team built a 6-1 lead after five ends en route to a 7-3 victory during the 12:15 draw Friday afternoon at the Heather Curling Club.

Gray-Withers, who went on to drop a 6-5 decision to St. Vital’s Victoria Beaudry during Friday’s late draw at the Manitoba junior curling championship, admitted the loss to Sagert had a rattling effect.

“We kind of looked at it as a reality check,” said Gray-Withers, a 17-year-old Grade 12 student at St. Mary’s Academy. “I think we walked in here thinking that we had a pretty good chance of doing really well. Losing to a young team like that does hurt your confidence a bit but I think those girls played amazing. We came out and didn’t play as well as we hoped to.”

Gray-Withers and her teammates, who posted an 11-3 win over St. Vital’s Grace Beaudry and a 7-3 decision over Brandon’s Stacy Sime on opening day, struggled with their draw weight against Sagert and paid the price.

“I think we couldn’t figure out the ice, the weight control,” said Gray-Withers. “I think we were second-guessing each other. We weren’t totally playing as a team, which really hurt us in the end and we couldn’t pull back.”

Now tied for third in the Asham Express Red Group with a 2-2 record, the Gray-Withers team remained within range of being one of four teams to reach the playoff round following round-robin play Sunday afternoon and they’ll be hoping to cash in on some excellent chemistry they’ve developed since coming together as a unit a mere nine months ago.

“Basically we all needed a team,” explained Gray-Withers, who skipped another squad to a fifth-place finish at last year’s provincial championship. “Our players left us and we were all just kind of scrambling and that’s how we found each other.”

The first to join forces with Gray-Withers was lead Lane Prokopowich, a recent high school graduate from Dauphin who decided to move to Winnipeg and devote herself to curling full time for the season.

Casting about for a third and second, they added Kathryn and Brianna Cullen, 19- and 17-year-old sisters from Beausejour. The connection was almost immediate and the foursome went on to win four events and the tour points title before losing in the final of the Manitoba Junior Curling Tour to Elmwood’s Mackenzie Zacharias, the top junior women’s seed this week.

“We’ve been told several times that we have good team chemistry and I feel that, too, and I feel a lot more connected with these girls than I have with most of my competitive teams in the past,” said Kathryn Cullen, who is now attending university in St. Boniface. We communicate really well and get along great off the ice. We’re all friends, which is what you need to be on a team together. In the end, we all have the same goal.”

Kathryn Cullen, previously a skip for her entire competitive career, needed time to adjust to the responsibilities of a third.

“I had to really work out this summer and get some endurance so I could sweep,” she said.

But the unlikely combination of players from different regions of the province has made for a happy union on and off the ice.

“We had no idea how it was going to end up,” said Prokopowich. “To be honest, I was kind of scared to curl with sisters at first. Because I wasn’t sure how the dynamics would be on the ice but we all seem to have a good bond. We all support each other and if someone’s down on themselves, we know to pick them up. I’m kind of known on the team as an energizer bunny, so they depend on me to tell them it’s OK and be positive.”

The teammates also rely on coach Clint Cullen, Kathryn and Brianna’s dad, to help reset and gather themselves after a tough defeat.

“He’s super helpful after losses,” said Brianna Cullen, a Grade 12 student in Beausejour. “(He’s able) to break it down and he tells us to regroup and come back as a team.”

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Meanwhile, Zacharias of Elmwood and defending champion Shae Bevan of St. Vital both swept their games Friday and sit atop the Asham Black Group at 4-0. Hayley Bergman of Morris and Elmwood’s Meghan Walter lead the Asham Express Red Group with a 4-0 marks.

STILL UNBEATEN: two-time defending junior men’s champ J.T. Ryan of Assiniboine Memorial and Jordan McDonald of St. Vital are tied for top spot in the Asham Black Group with 4-0 records after a pair of victories each Friday.

Meanwhile, St. Vital’s Ryan Wiebe is 4-0 and leading the Asham Express Red Group.

mike.sawatzky@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @sawa14