Koe stunned in opener by unsung Harty
It was only a couple hours before Jeremy Harty took the ice at the Boston Pizza Cup against Kevin Koe that several of the curlers in the get-to-the-Brier event started speculating.
There could be a huge builtin advantage for the curlers not named Koe and Brendan Bottcher as the event opened at the Ellerslie Curling Club.
In the first Alberta men’s championship to be held in a curling rink instead of on Brier-calibre arena ice, the thought was that the No. 1 and No. 3 ranked teams in the world might have trouble playing on a surface that didn’t have the same time and curl as all the big money events.
Then it happened.
Harty, a 23-year-old Calgarian in his second provincial men’s championship, hit for three on the third end, managed a deuce in the eighth and put the run on co-favorite Koe. It went up on the scoreboard as 6-3 with the 10th end left unplayed.
Before the triple knockout bracket-style Alberta Boston Pizza Cup begins, it’s the curlers themselves who vote to decide the seedings. Koe was ranked No. 1. Harty was ranked No. 8. Usually opening day pretty much follows the seeding.
Not this day.
Aaron Sluchinski of Airdrie, the No. 6 seed, who didn’t win a game last year, scored four in the second end and upset No. 3 seed Karsten Sturmay of Leduc 7-6.
Earlier in the day Sluchinski, the 1997 Canadian Amateur golf champion, won his opener 11-4 over Dale Goehring of Calgary.
The event began with No. 12 seed and first-timer Corey Leach of Lac La Biche doubling the No. 5 seed, 14-timer James Pahl of Sherwood Park 6-3.
In the evening, Leach went on to scare No. 4 seed Ted Appelman by scoring one on each of the first three ends before losing 7-5.
While Bottcher defeated Dylan Vavrek of Sexsmith 8-4, he needed to score four on the fourth end to come back from down 4-2.
It’ll be Bottcher vs. Sluchinski and Hart vs. Applemen in Thursday’s 9 a.m. draw, with the winners meeting in the A Event final at 6:30.
Koe drops to B Event.
ICE TALK: Darren Moulding doesn’t often tell his skip that he might be making the wrong call.
But when it comes to the controversy about Alberta’s Boston Pizza Cup ending up in a curling club this year after years playing in Brier conditions on arena ice, Bottcher’s third says his skip should consider calling a time out with his comments that it’s disappointing.
Moulding, who just happens to be employed as an icemaker at the Lacombe Curling Club, takes the opposite view.
“I’m excited for it. I think it gives us an advantage.
“We play in clubs definitely more than Kevin Koe. And the fact that this year’s Alberta provincials are being held in a curling arena is the reason we turned down a couple of Slams earlier this year and played in some club spiels. We knew that the provincials would be in the club. We wanted to play on club ice.” There’s another factor. “We’ve been in Ellerslie practising and I’ve talked to icemaker Don Palmer about his plans. He has a beautiful surface and if we get real sharp rocks, I think it’ll be OK.
“It’s not going to be arena ice but I think you’re going to see really good club ice.”
Calgary-based national coach Paul Webster said the move to bring in Curling Canada’s rising star icemaker Jon Wall from Ottawa to help prepare it prior to the event went a long way to creating ice that was somewhere between curling club ice and arena ice and none of the lower seeds who began play were complaining about it.
Most of the teams had been told they’d be using Ellerslie club rocks, but that situation was solved with the borrowing of Curling Canada stones used recently at the Canadian Juniors in Prince Albert.