Peterson’s fate rests on P.E.I. playdown

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 22/01/2021 (2006 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Never have Winnipeggers had such a keen interest in Prince Edward Island curling.

Beth Peterson’s team from the Assiniboine Memorial Club in Winnipeg is in anxious-wait mode, anticipating an invite to the 2021 Scotties Tournament of Hearts national women’s championship next month in the Calgary bubble but understanding it’s still not a foregone conclusion.

Remarkably, four squads hailing from Manitoba are among the Scotties field, expanded to 18 teams this year by Curling Canada to include 14 provincial/territorial representatives, the returning champion and three wild-card teams.

Peterson, ranked 12th on the Canadian Team Ranking System, joins the fray as a wild-card team if things go according to script the last weekend of January and Suzanne Birt of the Montague Curling Club captures her third consecutive P.E.I. women’s title.

Birt, ninth on the CTRS, is the two-time reigning provincial champion of Canada’s smallest province, and has earned four of the last six titles. The team is matched up in a best-of-five series against the unheralded Darlene London foursome.

If Birt loses, she still gets the final wild-card spot, erasing Peterson’s hopes.

“We are huge Suzanne Birt fans,” said the 26-year-old Peterson. “We laughed about having a Zoom party to watch the (P.E.I.) linescores next weekend. We’ll be watching them pretty closely.”

Gimli’s Kerri Einarson, the 2020 national champion, returns to defend the Scotties title as Team Canada, set for Feb. 19-28 with no fans in the stands and strict health protocols in place at Markin MacPhail Centre.

The 2021 provincials were cancelled by Curl Manitoba, owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, paving the way for ‘20 runner-up Jennifer Jones of St. Vital to don the buffalo.

Curling Canada announced Friday the 2019-20 CRTS standings would determine all three wild-card teams for both the Scotties and the Brier men’s championship, provided those team have at least three of four returning members in order to be eligible.

Tracy Fleury of East St. Paul, ranked No. 2 in the points race, will fill the first wild-card spot, while 11th-ranked Mackenzie Zacharias of Altona, the reigning world junior women’s champion, is also in.

Left on the outside looking in are Alberta’s Kelsey Rocque (ranked sixth) and Saskatchewan’s Robyn Silvernagle (10th). However, both lost two players following the 2019-20 competitive campaign and were deemed ineligible.

That propelled Zacharias — and possibly Peterson — into the championship.

Zacharias, a 21-year-old university student who skipped her team to the 2020 world crown in Russia last February, won’t start celebrating until they’re officially summoned by the national federation.

“Not 100 per cent official. We haven’t received any word from Curling Canada but the news looks really promising,” Zacharias said Friday afternoon. “A year ago, we were at junior nationals. If you told us we’d have a potential opportunity to go to the Scotties in a year, we would never have believed that. It’s just insane.

“We had so much planned this year. We wanted to play in a lot of bonspiels and travel across the country, and the goal was to qualify for provincials and give it our best. Never did the team think we’d end up going to the Scotties but here we are, and we’re so excited for this potential opportunity.”

Zacharias plays with her sister, Emily (second), along with third Karlee Burgess and lead Lauren Lenetine.

“Three of us live together and it’s hard not to talk about it or get our hopes up. It’s definitely been a long wait to hear more news and we still have a couple of weeks to wait after the playdowns in P.E.I. We’re just thrilled to be considered for the Scotties in the bubble,” said Zacharias.

Peterson is joined on her team by third Jenna Loder, second Katherine Doerksen and lead Melissa Gordon.

“We would be excited about the opportunity but we’ll just sit in anticipation until next weekend,” said Loder. “As much as anyone else, we were pretty gutted at the cancellation of the season. But the health and safety of everyone has been more important than curling. We’ve continually been planning throughout the winter, staying in shape and mentally preparing, so this is a surprise for us but we’re ready if the opportunity arises.”

In men’s play, 2020 Viterra champion Jason Gunnlaugson of Morris returns to the Brier, March 5-14, while Mike McEwen of East St. Paul heads west as a wild-card team.

The other two wild-card spots go to a couple of former world champions, Kevin Koe of Alberta and Glenn Howard of Ontario.

The venue will hold six events over about nine weeks, including the Canadian mixed doubles championship, world men’s championship and a pair of Grand Slam of Curling men’s and women’s bonspiels, which usually feature a stellar international contingent.

 

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPJasonBell