Cougars hurry hard to the gold

The Catholic Central Cougars mixed curling team had nothing to lose.

So they went out and won it all.

The Cougars rink of skip Ryan Kawa, third Sam Lychak, second Logan Boras and lead Ella Clarke defeated the Chinook Coyotes 6-3 in the gold medal game of the Alberta Schools Athletic Association South Zone playdowns Wednesday at the Lethbridge Curling Club.

“We came in with nothing to lose,” said Kawa, whose team is off to provincials in St. Albert March 1-3. “So we ended up leaving with a banner. Chinook played awesome. It was a tough game, the best we’ve ever played.”

The CCH zone title was onethird of a gold medal sweep for Lethbridge schools Wednesday.

The LCI Rams boys won their second consecutive Zone gold medal thanks to a 10-2 win over Medicine Hat, while the Winston Churchill Griffins captured the girls championship with an 8-6 win over the Taber W.R. Myers Rebels.

With a rink made up of threequarter rookies, it was understandable the Cougars took a casual approach to the past two days.

“This is the first year we’ve been together, but this is about my sixth or seventh year of curling. The rest of my team is all first-year curlers,” said Kawa. “We all really showed up today. I’m really proud of my team. In the round-robin we didn’t play as well as we should, so we took the long road to provincials, but we’re going to St. Albert.”

In the eyes of the veteran, his rookie teammates were quick learners.

“They’re really eager to learn, I couldn’t have asked for a better team,” said Kawa. “They never really learned takeouts until probably two weeks ago. They really showed up today.”

As for what happens in St. Albert, the Catholic Central foursome will once again take the wait-and-see approach.

“We have a (zones) gold medal and a banner so I can’t complain," said Kawa.

In the boys gold medal game, the Rams blew open a 2-2 game with some timely steals and deuces on their way to their second zone gold in as many years.

“We started off with two in the first end, it was a little shaky, but we came back and got two,” said skip Ayden Whittmire, who curls with third Kyler Kurina, second Dawson Wikkerink and two leads who split the zone duties, Jackson Fletcher and Kaden Zmeko. “We forced them to a blank in the next end and then they made a couple good shots and got two. From then on we stole a couple of points and got our twos.”

With their second South Zones gold medal secured, the Rams look to do the same at the provincial level in St. Albert.

“I’ve known all of these guys for at least three years, but we’ve never played all together as the same team,” said Whittmire.

Winston Churchill’s gold medal-winning girls’ team included Susan Quan, Kaylawnni Butler, Jordy Neudorf and Kyra Gertridge.

In the mixed doubles bronze medal game, the Taber W.R. Myers Rebels defeated the Vulcan County Central Hawks 7-3, while the Chinook Coyotes girls beat Vulcan 8-6.

Warner captured the boys bronze medal with a 13-2 win over Catholic Central.