A trip to the world championships in South Korea will be on the line when Team B.C. plays in the final of the 2017 Canadian Junior Curling Championship on Sunday afternoon.
Cloverdale’s Tyler Tardi, 18, skips the team, which also includes his older brother Jordan and their father, Paul, as coach.
On Thursday evening at Archie Browning Sports Centre in Victoria, the team advanced directly to the men’s gold-medal game with a big victory.
Tardi, backed up by vice-skip Sterling Middleton, second Jordan Tardi and lead Nick Meister, scored back-to-back three-enders in the fourth and fifth ends and sailed home with a 9-3 win over Prince Edward Island’s Tyler Smith (1-5, 4-5 overall; Charlottetown).
The victory improved B.C.’s record in the championship round to a perfect 6-0 (7-1 overall), clinched first place in the round robin and earned a bye directly to Sunday’s men’s gold-medal game (1:30 p.m., all times PST).
The tournaments’ winning men’s and women’s teams will represent Canada at the 2017 VoIP Defender World Junior Championships, Feb. 16-26 in Gangneung, South Korea.
CLICK HERE for the tourney schedule and stats.
“As long as we earn the right (colour), I’m OK with it,” said a smiling Tardi, whose team is aiming to improve on the bronze medal it won at the 2016 Canadian Juniors in Stratford, Ont.
“Ever since the championship round started, we’ve been kicking it into second gear. And now, it’s just playing the waiting game.”
While B.C.’s playoff fate is secure, the identity of the two combatants in Saturday’s 5:30 p.m. semifinal won’t be known until Friday.
Manitoba’s JT Ryan (Winnipeg) still had first-place aspirations going into Thursday night’s draw but suffered his second loss of the championship round, bowing 6-5 to Ontario’s Matthew Hall (Kitchener), after Hall coolly drew to the four-foot for the win int he 10th end, looking at two Manitoba counters.
That left Manitoba, Ontario and Northern Ontario’s Tanner Horgan (Copper Cliff) all with 4-2 records in the championship round, while Nova Scotia’s Matthew Manuel (Halifax) is still in the hunt for a tiebreaker berth with a 3-3 record.
Manitoba finishes up Friday (today) at 9 a.m. against B.C., while Ontario takes on P.E.I.’s Tyler Smith (1-5; Charlottetown) and Northern Ontario is up against New Brunswick’s Liam Marin (1-5; Saint John).
“It was definitely a huge win for us, to put us in a really great position,” said Hall. “It keeps our fate in our own hands; we don’t have to worry about anyone else. We just have to go out and play a good game tomorrow; we don’t have to worry about any other games working in our favour.”
Tardi, meanwhile, can use the game against Manitoba — which features, the Tardis’ cousin Jacques Gauthier at vice-skip — as a tuneup for the gold-medal game on Sunday.
“We know it’s going to be a competitive game; we’ve always been super-competitive with our cousin,” said Tardi. “I’m just excited to play. We know our next two games are in the arena, so we just want to get used to that; tune up a couple things. We don’t really need to worry too much about the scoreboard. Just stay sharp.”
TSN/RDS2 will provide live and exclusive coverage of the womenʼs and menʼs semifinals on Saturday, Jan. 28, and finals on Sunday, Jan. 29. The same games also will be streamed live in the U.S. on ESPN3.
-Curling Canada
