The Quesnel Sponsor League needed a full-team draw-to-the-button shoot-out to decide its playoff champion earlier this month (March 13).
The Blair Hedden-skipped Ski-Hi Scaffolding team was tied with Ray Blackmore’s Century 21 squad for the lead after the league’s A division double-round-robin playoffs.
As the two teams were knotted up with records of 4-2 and had split the pair of games they played, it was decided that a shootout was in order.
Each team member took a single shot at the button, which is the centre of the target at the scoring end.
The group with the lowest total distance between their rocks and the button was to be declared winner.
When the frost had settled, Hedden’s squad had the superior shooting, winning him his first Quesnel Sponsor League Championship as skip.
“It’s kind of cool,” says Hedden. “It’s really good competition, and it’s not an easy thing to do, so it’s rewarding that we did it finally.”
The skip says his team was struggling earlier on in the season, losing four out of their first six games, but they were able to pull it together as they got the hang of playing with one another.
“We started really slowly,” Hedden says, “but we only lost one or two [in the second half of the season].”
Eight teams make up the Sponsor League.
They played a double-round-robin during the regular season, meaning each team played every other team twice.
Once the regular season ended, the top four teams competed in the A Division, and the bottom dwellers matched up in the B Division.
On the B side, Dave Plant’s Service Electric team clinched the playoffs with four wins, a loss and a tie.
READ MORE: Team Wawryk wins Quesnel Curling Club’s St. Paddy’s Day Bonspiel
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