The Press and Journal (Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire)
Seven of best for champions
Eve Muirhead and David Murdoch led their rinks to Scottish championship success at Perth’s Dewars Centre and earned their seventh national titles on Saturday.
Muirhead’s rink won the women’s title with another powerful performance to beat Hannah Fleming’s rink 6-4 to maintain their unbeaten record in the tournament.
“Every one of the seven titles feels as good as the last one. It is a pretty special feeling taking the Scottish title, so to win it again is great,” said Muirhead.
“We are a year out from the Olympics and this result shows the changes we made before this season are the right ones. This year we took on a new coach Glenn Howard and it has been a positive experience for all of us that has shown in the results we have had.
“As Team Muirhead we know we have a target on our backs, so we have to focus on one game at a time.”
They will now represent Scotland at the world championships in Beijing in two weeks and will try to qualify GB a place for the next Winter Olympics in PyeongChang.
For team-mates Anna Sloan and Vicki Adams the championship win represented their sixth national title, while Lauren Gray was celebrating her maiden victory in the tournament.
In the men’s final the Olympic silver medallists Team Murdoch’s experience prevailed when tested by the world junior champions led by Bruce Mouat, beating the young rink 10-4.
Team-mates Greg Drummond, Scott Andrews and Michael Goodfellow added the title to their CVs for a fourth time while David Murdoch claimed his seventh title.
Murdoch said: “It doesn’t matter who we play in the final, there are so many tough teams out there.”