Safeway, Scottie qualifiers to get look

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This article was published 15/04/2009 (6310 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

SOME of Manitoba’s greatest curlers, including Jon Mead, Lois Fowler and John Helston, will be brought together to review the Manitoba Curling Association’s sometimes contentious provincial championship formats and qualifying process.

"It’s been a long time since we’ve reviewed any of our championships, so like any good organization, you sit back and you look at your programs and your services and you do a review and we see are they meeting our needs or aren’t they?" MCA executive director Shane Ray said.

"If they’re meeting our needs, we might not change anything. If they’re not, then obviously we’ll need to change."

Complaints about the qualifying process and the format for provincial championships have gone on for years. World champions Jeff Stoughton and Kerry Burtnyk have both questioned whether 32 teams, many of them overmatched at the Safeway men’s championship, should qualify for the event by winning their zones.

"In some cases, there’s three teams competing for one spot, and is that fair?" Ray asked. "Whereas you might go to another region and there’s 12 teams competing for one spot. It’s the qualifying that we really need to look at as well. That’s the impetus for it."

Some club curlers have said the zone qualifying system and the current size of the MCA events must be maintained in order to ensure that all curlers, from all regions and skill levels, have a shot at a provincials berth, whether they’re competitive once they get there or not.

"We need to take into account what a championship does for development, what does it do for the host committee," Ray said. "We talk to host committees and they say if the Safeway championship was eight teams, then we’re not interested in hosting it anymore because it’s not the same event."

chris.cariou@freepress.mb.ca

 

Champions to review who can play for title

Members of the MCA’s championship review committee:

John Helston (Winnipeg) — 1984 Brier champion, Curling Hall of Famer

Lois Fowler (Brandon) — Six-time Manitoba champion in women’s, mixed and seniors

Terry Ursel (Plumas) — Curled in past five provincial Scotties

Jon Mead (Winnipeg) — Hall of Famer, 1999 Brier champ, two-time world silver medallist

Justin Richter (Beausejour) — Three-time Grand Slam competitor, MCT regular

Rose Neufeld (Winnipeg) — Current MCA president

Rae Hainstock (Thompson) — Current MCA board member