Quesnel curling came to an early head last weekend as the curling club hosted the biggest bonspiel on the calendar – the Grey Cup cash spiel.
With five digits worth of money ($10,000) up for grabs, teams had dollar signs in their eyes as the curled for cash.
Rink manager, Dave Plant was happy with the event and the teams that made it out.
“It was wide open,” he said.
“Most teams were competitive and if they played their best they did well.”
In the ‘G’ event (otherwise known as the ‘A’ event though you’ll notice a certain logic to the letter change if you pay attention), the Tracy Jones rink, from P.G. took on the local Ray Blackmore rink, over turning the locals 6-4 in an exciting final.
The teams were so closely matched that after six ends, the game was tied at four a piece, but the Jones rink stole two in the seventh then went on to run Blackmore out of rocks in the eighth to secure the win.
In the ‘R event, it came down to a pair of Quesnel skips: Alex Coffey and Ben Ruether; the former winning the contest, 6-4. Though the final score was similar to the ‘G’ event final, Coffey lead the game for most of the ends.
By the fourth end, Coffey was up 4-1, but Ruether made for a comeback, pushing the score to 4-3 after six ends. The comeback wasn’t meant to be however, as Coffey took two more in the seventh, with Ruether marking a lonely point in the eighth, which wasn’t enough to change the tides.
In the ‘E’ event, the Ron Vandestar rink, hailing out of Smithers took first place, beat the winners of the prestigious G event, the Tracy Jones Rink.
In the ‘Y’ event, Ruether lead his rink to a first place finish against their rivals from the R event, the Alex Coffey rink.
The event drew 16 teams onto the sheets, with three making a special trip into town from the surrounding cities to challenge the local teams.
The format was changed from the usual format to double knockout, which gave teams a boatload of games, with teams playing up to seven games over the course of the tournament. It also lead to the interesting G/Y finals, as a team could win up to two events: teams that won the G or R event could try to continue their reign in the E and Y event.
The rink will stay quiet, except for Christmas parties, until the last full weekend of January, 24 – 26, 2014 when they will host the Ladies Wheel and Spiel.
