Victoria rink wins B.C. mixed championship

If once was good, then twice and thrice have to be that much better.

Alex Horvath made it a triple-header championship season in curling as part of Cameron de Jong’s Victoria rink which captured the 2019 B.C. mixed curling championship Sunday in Vancouver.

Horvath, also assistant ice maker at Victoria Curling Club, was earlier in the season part of the Tardi team that won both the 2019 Canadian and world junior men’s championships.

The victorious provincialchampion Victoria mixed team was skipped by former B.C. junior men’s champion de Jong and also featured Horvath, former B.C. junior women’s champion Taylor Reese-Hansen and was rounded out by Mariah Coulombe.

De Jong defeated Sarah Daniels rink from Delta Thistle Curling Club in Sunday’s final. Team Daniels qualified through the A Event of the triple-knockout draw, then went on to beat Kimberley’s Team Buchy, the B-Event qualifiers, in the Page Playoff, winning a bye to the final.

The De Jong rink, which had qualified through the C Event, knocked out the Okanagan’s Team Tolley, then went on to beat Buchy in the semifinals Sunday morning. The Buchy rink, with fatherdaughter duos Tom and Kaila Buchy and Dave and Arissa Toffolo, won the bronze medal.

In the final, the teams traded single points or blanked ends until the fifth end when de Jong was able to score three. Daniels replied with one in the sixth and a steal of one in the seventh to leave de Jong leading 4-3 with hammer in the eighth and final end. The teams shook hands when Daniels ran out of rocks.

Daniels, a three-time B.C. junior champion and three-time silver medallist at junior nationals, settled for the silver medal, while de Jong’s Victoria crew advanced to the Canadian mixed championship Nov. 4-9 in Saguenay, Quebec.