Big guns advance to A-side qualifiers in curling championship

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This article was published 10/02/2016 (2996 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

SELKIRK — The Manitoba men’s curling championship continued to unfold according to form at the Selkirk Recreation Complex Thursday.

No. 1 seed Reid Carruthers and second-seeded Mike McEwen and 2016 Canadian junior champion Matt Dunstone all advanced to A-side qualifiers with wins on the 12:15 p.m. draw.

Carruthers hammered La Salle’s Randy Neufeld 9-2, McEwen beat Brandon’s Terry McNamee 11-4 and Dunstone beat Fort Rouge’s Tyler Drews 7-2.

Also advancing to qualifying games with wins Thursday afternoon were Thistle’s Scott Ramsay, who defeated Stonewall’s Jared Kolomaya 6-5, and Dennis Bohn, who hammered twin brother David Bohn 9-2.

The four A-side qualifying games will be played today at 8:30 a.m..

McEwen plays Dennis Bohn, Carruthers plays Ramsay, Dunstone plays third seed Willie Lyburn and fourth seed Daley Peters plays fifth seed Alex Forrest. Forrest, Peters and Lyburn all advanced with wins earlier Thursday.

Put it all together and the top six seeds this week — Dunstone is the sixth — are all still undefeated after two days of competition.

The much-anticipated battle of the Bohn brothers didn’t prove to be much of a battle at all Thursday — Dennis scored a deuce with the hammer in the first end and then three more in the third end to jump out to an early 5-1 lead he never relinquished.

It was the first time the brothers — who’d been teammates for decades and lost a Manitoba final together in 2008 — had ever faced each other at the provincials.

“We kept our distance,” said David Bohn. “We didn’t talk much. He was making his shots, and I was trying to make mine.”

With the loss, seventh-seeded David Bohn became the highest-ranked team to lose a game this week. Dennis Bohn said he had mixed feelings about the win over his longtime teammate.

“It would have been fun to have a closer game there,” said Dennis.

“He was short on a couple of draws, and that was big for me. It kind of made it easier from there… But they’ll turn it around and play better. And we might meet them again.”

You can almost count on that — playing on separate teams for the first time ever this winter, Thursday’s meeting was the fifth time this winter the Bohn brothers have already played each other.

Ramsay’s eighth-seeded squad is a throwback to a simpler time in curling.

Longtime Ramsay second Ross McFadyen describes the team’s curling philosophy this way: “We don’t travel anywhere, and we don’t play guys with numbers on their backs.”

Ramsay adds a third team rule: “We don’t go to the gym.”

The “guys with numbers on their backs” are, of course, the elite teams such as Carruthers and McEwen who do go to the gym, travel the world on the cash circuit and have taken curling as close to a full-time profession as anyone at this point.

Ramsay, on the other hand, curls only locally on the Manitoba Curling Tour (six events this year) and reduces the game to its simplest terms. With all kinds of experience on his team — McFadyen, third Mark Taylor and lead Kyle Werenich are mainstays at provincial competitions year after year — Ramsay makes waves at this event every year.

While he’s always a playoff contender, Ramsay is still looking for his first Manitoba men’s championship.

He’s not optimistic it’s coming any time soon. “We’ve got a shot like anyone,” says Ramsay, “but realistically, no, we’re not going to win this thing.

“But this is just a really good bunch of guys, we have a lot of fun, and they’re all good curlers. It’s a chance to get away once in a while. And we win the odd bonspiel.”

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek