Thunder Bay’s Team McCarville defeated Sudbury’s Team Fleury 8-4 on Sunday to capture the Northern Ontario Scotties Tournament at McIntyre Curling Club in Timmins.
During the tournament Team McCarville won all three of the games they played against Team Fleury.
McCarville will now advance to represent Northern Ontario at the Canadian Scott Tournament of Hearts in Grand Prairie Alberta February 20-28.
“I am so excited to win the provincials,” said skip Krista McCarville. “I feel that this team that we put together this year is a special team and I believe we can be a team that is difficult to beat.”
In Sunday’s final match, McCarville took a 2-0 lead after the first end and never looked back.
A missed take out shot by Team Fleury enabled McCarville to make two points.
Fleury came back to make it 2-1 after ends with a well-placed final shot by Tracy Fleury that landed almost dead centre in the house.
In the fourth, Team Fleury had shot rock and was poised to pick up at least two points, but McCarville with last rock was able to knock out the two Fleury rocks and positioned themselves to pick up two.
Team McCarville now led 4-1 at the end of four rounds.
The fifth end was the best for Team Fleury with skip Tracy Fleury taking out the McCarville’s shot rock and leaving three of their own rocks in the house for three points to tie the match 4-4.
But that’s as close it got for Fleury. In the end Team McCarville just proved to be too strong for the defending Northern Ontario champs.
Team Fleury was unable to take advantage of final shots in ends 6 and 8 which ended up as blanks with neither team able to pick up points.
The seventh end proved to be the turning point of the match.
The house was crowded with blue Fleury rocks and red McCarville rocks.
Fleury tried to nudge out McCarville’s shot rock nullifying the other two rocks that were counting as points.
However, Fleury’s shot was a touch too soft and fell short.
McCarville was able to place a third rock on her final shot to count three points.
After seven ends McCarville now led 7-4.
They added a single point in the ninth end making the final score 8-4 to capture the Northern Ontario Scott Tournament of Hearts with a perfect 7-0 record.
Team Fleury finished second with a 4-3 record.
All three losses at the hands of Team McCarville.
“Fleury is a tough team, they were the Northern Ontario reps last year winning against them was important for us,” McCarville said at the conclusion of the match.
Team McCarville will now prepare for the Canadian Scotties Tournament in Grand Prairie on February 20-28.
“We are going to prepare with lots of practice, going to the gym and stay physically fit for those long games sometimes you have three games in a bonspiel,” McCarville said. “We don’t have many games scheduled between now and the tournaments so we will have to put together some scrub games.”
According to Tracy Fleury, skip of Team Fleury the difference in the match was consistency.
“We made a lot of big shots, but probably had a few more misses than they did,” Fleury said.
“We learned a lot, and of course we are disappointed with the loss,” Fleury added. “But the McCarville team deserved it and Northern Ontario will be well represented.”
Team Fleury goes back to league play in Sudbury after taking some time off and looks forward to competing in the 2017 Northern Ontario Scotties.
