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Eight Ends: Young guns shine at Canadian juniors

The future looks bright for Canadian curling.

The young guns of the sport shined at the Canadian Junior Curling Championships this past week with top talent emerging from coast to coast.

While there could be only one junior men’s and one junior women’s champion, it was clear there were several other worthy winners who could form the next core group of elite teams.

1st End: Dunstone on point in Canadian junior men’s final

Matt Dunstone is back on top of the mountain in junior men’s curling.

Dunstone captured his second Canadian junior men’s championship — and fourth straight for Manitoba — Sunday shooting the lights out during an 11-4 victory over Northern Ontario’s Tanner Horgan.

The 20-year-old from Winnipeg also won the event in 2013 with Braden Calvert earning back-to-back national titles in 2014 and 2015.

Team Dunstone’s stellar play in the final caught the attention of the curling sphere of the Twitter-verse with the men’s field on alert for their future competition.

Dunstone and his team featuring Colton Lott, Kyle Doering, and Rob Gordon are now off to represent Canada at the world juniors next month in Copenhagen, Denmark. Should they return home with a gold medal, Team Dunstone will earn a spot at the season finale Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling event, the Champions Cup.

Dunstone already made his Pinty’s GSOC debut this season filling in for Carter Rycroft on Pat Simmons’ team at the Meridian Canadian Open in December. Will we see a return to the series at the Champions Cup? Stay tuned.

2nd End: Kudos to Team Horgan

Team Horgan should keep their heads up high following a breakout week.

Although Tanner Horgan, his younger brother Jake Horgan, Nick Bissonnette, and Maxime Blais had to settle for silver, the Copper Cliff crew showed plenty of promise throughout the event posting a 9-1 record in the round robin (including an extra-end win over Dunstone) to earn the bye straight to the final.

Tanner is 17 years old and Jake is just 15; the Horgan bros. will be contending on the junior scene for a few more years.

Next up for Team Horgan is the Northern Ontario men’s playdowns in North Bay with their first game against reigning Olympic champion Brad Jacobs. No biggie, right?

3rd End: Fay takes junior women’s crown

It was only a matter of time until Mary Fay won the Canadian junior women’s championship.

Well, that time has come as the 17-year-old from Nova Scotia defeated B.C.’s Sarah Daniels 9-5 in Sunday’s final to capture the title. It’s Fay’s second medal at the event after she took home bronze two years ago.

After rocky sixth and seventh ends giving up consecutive steals that tied the game 5-5, Fay took back control of the final making a key draw for a deuce in eight, stealing two more points in the ninth to extend her lead and running B.C. out of rocks in the final frame to seal the deal.

Team Fay includes third Kristin Clarke, second Karlee Burgess, and lead Janique LeBlanc.

Fay now not only heads overseas for the world juniors but also to join Burgess on the Canadian mixed team for the Youth Olympics in Lillehammer, Norway.

4th End: BC qualifies for both playoffs

The B.C. junior championships showed the province was sending two solid teams to nationals and both proved to be worthy of the spots by returning home with medals.

Tyler Tardi and Sarah Daniels qualified for the playoffs, with Tardi earning bronze and Daniels taking silver.

Tardi and fellow B.C. native Sterling Middleton will play with Fay and Burgess on Team Canada at the Youth Olympics.

5th End: Nunavut wins historic first games

It was a success story that was repeated the following day. Sadie Pinksen skipped the Nunavut junior women’s team to its first victory ever topping Northwest Territories 7-3 last Tuesday. Then 24 hours later, Arthur Siksik guided the territory’s junior men’s team to their first win defeating Northwest Territories 9-6.

Nunavut’s curling program is still relatively new and Pinksen has been there since the start when the territory made its junior national debut three years ago. There have been growing pains along the way and it’s easy to get frustrated and discouraged when those losses pile up, but both Pinksen and Siksik remained upbeat about the experience they were gaining. It’s a clear reminder of why we compete and we could all certainly learn from their never-give-up, stay-positive attitude.

6th End: Scotties field set

Provincial playdowns continued this past weekend and surprise, surprise another upset. This time it was in Saskatchewan where Jolene Campbell beat double defending champion Stefanie Lawton in Sunday’s final.

Campbell has been to the Scotties Tournament of Hearts before, three times in fact, as the alternate for Amber Holland’s team. She won the title and a silver medal at the worlds with the rink in 2011. The following year she played for Team Holland in the round robin of the Scotties when Tammy Schneider was hurt, and Campbell had the highest player percentage among all seconds.

Also worth noting is Campbell’s third: Ashley Howard, daughter of legendary curler Russ Howard (who serves as the team’s coach).

Sylvie Robichaud (New Brunswick), Kerry Galusha (Northwest Territories), and Stacie Curtis (Newfoundland and Labrador) also earned their spots to the Scotties.

Below is the complete field set to compete Feb. 20-28 in Grande Prairie, Alta.:

Team Skip
Team Canada Jennifer Jones
Alberta Chelsea Carey
B.C. Karla Thompson
Manitoba Kerri Einarson
New Brunswick Sylvie Robichaud
Newfoundland & Labrador Stacie Curtis
Northwest Territories Kerry Galusha
Northern Ontario Krista McCarville
Nova Scotia Jill Brothers
Nunavut Geneva Chislett
Ontario Jenn Hanna
P.E.I. Suzanne Birt
Quebec Marie-France Larouche
Saskatchewan Jolene Campbell
Yukon Nicole Baldwin

Note: B.C., Northwest Territories, Nunavut and Yukon will play in a pre-qualifying tournament.

7th End: Brier field shaping up

With the Scotties field set, attention now focuses on the men’s playdowns. A few notables have already qualified for next month’s Tim Hortons Brier in Ottawa.

Brad Gushue of St. John’s claimed his 13th Tankard title in 14 years (if you’re wondering about the missing year, he was kinda busy overseas in 2006). It’s another step on Gushue’s road as he attempts to win his first career Brier title and thus be able to return next year as Team Canada when his home province hosts the event.

Adam Casey will also make another trip to the Brier as he successfully defended the P.E.I. Tankard title Monday.

Joining Gushue and Casey at the Brier so far will be Jamie Murphy (Nova Scotia), Jean-Michel Menard (Quebec), Jamie Koe (Northwest Territories), Wade Kingdon (Nunavut), Bob Smallwood (Yukon) and reigning champion Pat Simmons (Team Canada).

8th End: The week ahead

The Recharge with Milk Tankard is underway in Brantford to determine the Ontario champion. Toronto’s John Epping stole the show on Monday, literally, as he won both his games via steals without holding the hammer once.

Also worth noting is Glenn Howard and Joe Frans reaching into the spare player pool to complete their rosters. Howard’s third Wayne Middaugh sustained a broken leg last month during a skiing accident while Frans’ regular skip Scott Bailey is attending a work gathering. Adam Spencer, who played with Team Howard at the Tour Challenge, rejoined the club on Day 1 of the Tankard with Frans adding Team Kean’s Fraser Reid. Teams requiring a player from the pool must apply prior to each and every draw.

New Brunswick and Saskatchewan are also set to get underway with the remaining provinces holding their men’s playdowns next week.

Keep it here for updates and tune to Sportsnet ONE on Sunday for live coverage of the Ontario semifinal and final.