Koe, Bottcher survive for weeKend play
‘Too straight’ curling club ice proves to be a challenge for Boston Pizza Cup contenders
Embrace it. Or go home early.
That was the challenge facing Kevin Koe and Brendan Bottcher when they came to the Ellerslie Curling Club Friday.
Both succeeded in staying around to play this weekend, Bottcher in Saturday night’s A-B final and Koe in C-event elimination games.
It’s the first Alberta men’s curling championship on curling club ice in almost 20 years and Koe came to the rink Friday evening down to his last life in the triple-knockout event that sends the winner to the Brier.
The three-time Brier champion, two-time world champion and most recent Olympian lost twice in the first two nights of the event, but defeated Scott Garnett of Strathmore 9-3 Friday night to advance.
“It is what it is. It’s your typical club ice. It’s just too straight. But we have to adjust to it,” Koe said.
Two-time Olympian and Vancouver 2010 gold-medal winner Ben Hebert, who won two Briers with Kevin Martin and another with Koe, said, “I’ve never played in a club in provincials ever before.
“My first two years in Saskatchewan was in an arena and all my years in Alberta have been in arenas. It’s a different game. We’re used to curling around rocks in the eight-foot and making really precise freezes and a lot of things like that, but this is where we are. We didn’t address it well in the first two days. But if we don’t address it in every game we play now, we’re going home,” he said.
Thursday’s 10-4 defeat at the hands of Ted Appelman of Edmonton resulted in double defending champion Bottcher deciding to embrace it.
“What we’re dealing with here is not arena ice, but it is great club ice. I imagine Kevin Koe has been having a lot of the same issues we’re having as well,” said Bottcher.
“A lot of shots we are used to playing just aren’t there and some of the more precise shots are just harder to make. You have to play a more simple curling game and that’s not a bad thing. It’s definitely great ice if you have a little bit of a lead to front-run with,” he said.
His third Darren Moulding is the icemaker in Lacombe.
“You don’t get club ice much better than this,” he said.
“But it’s still club ice. And we’ve decided to embrace the challenge of playing on it. We talked about it as a team. Simplify our game a little bit. Embrace what we’re doing here. We can’t change it.”
Bottcher scored deuces on each of the first three ends to dispatch Dylan Vavrek of Sexsmith 12-4 in the afternoon and then followed a deuce with a steal of two, a steal of one and another steal of two to advance to the A-B game with a 9-2 win over 23-year-old Jeremy Harty of Calgary.
SO LONG, FAREWELL
It wasn’t exactly The Sound of Music playing at the Ellerslie Curling Club. But the lyrics were the same.
So long, farewell, auf Wiedersehen, adieu.
Adieu, adieu, to yieu and yieu and yieu.
Friday was moving day at the Boston Pizza Cup. As in moving out.
Dale Goehring of Calgary, Warren Cross of Edmonton and James Pahl of Sherwood Park were the first to be eliminated Friday morning.
Corey Leach, the first-timer from Lac La Biche, Aaron Sluchinski of Airdrie and Scott Garnett said goodbye in the evening draw.
MAD HATTER IS HAPPY
When Moulding curled without his $84,500 curling hat here Thursday, he felt naked.
And he was wearing a hat. But it was a plain black baseball cap.
You may have noticed, if you watched the Bottcher bunch win the most recent Pinty’s Grand Slam event in North Battleford, Sask., and the TSN skins game from Banff, that third Moulding wore a Lacombe Curling Club baseball cap in both events.
As mentioned, Moulding is the icemaker in Lacombe.
“It’s in my contract that I can’t miss the Farmers Bonspiel. When I talked to the guys at the Lacombe Curling Club about missing it, they weren’t super happy, but they kind of understood where we were and where I was coming from. So they said ‘Well, you can go, but can you wear a Lacombe Curling Club hat ... at the Slam?’
“I said I’d talk to the guys, but I couldn’t see why not. The guys said ‘Sure.’”
But the officials didn’t say “sure” here until Friday, when Moulding returned to the ice wearing his Lacombe logo lid.
“They decided it wasn’t advertising and I think what decided it was that it was an affiliated club.
“I’d worn that hat for eight games in two events and we’ve won $84,500 with it. Then we lost. I was going to go back to wearing it covered in black tape. So it’s been worth my investment. It’s been a really lucky hat.”