MacEwan Athletics
LEDUC – Needing a triple takeout with her final stone to stay alive, MacEwan skip Ashton Simard pulled off a highlight-reel shot that had the Leduc Rec Centre crowd roaring in cheers in the semifinal of the Canadian Colleges Athletic Association women's curling championship on Tuesday night.
She ran back a Fanshawe rock onto their three in the four-foot and somehow was lying one when the smoke cleared.
Although the Griffins ultimately came up short, losing 6-5 to the Falcons in an extra end, they can hold their heads high after bringing their 'A' game to the national stage.
"They played their hearts out," said head coach Tom Kitagawa. "I would love to see the stats because I'm sure both teams (will be up there). I really enjoyed this game from a coaching perspective."
The stats confirm what the crowd witnessed – this was a true gem. And perhaps the Griffins deserved a better fate after curling at a combined 79 per cent clip compared to 72 per cent for the Falcons. Particularly on fire were Simard (80 per cent) and lead Sara Fraser (83 per cent). MacEwan second Andie Kurjata (77 per cent) and third Erin Wells (76 per cent) were also on point.
"Both teams shot the lights out," said Kitagawa. "They played so well. To me, that was a national championship game right there.
"Give Fanshawe credit. They played really well. But to our credit, we played really well. It was very evenly matched."
The match was tight all the way through with MacEwan twice getting steals of one, while Fanshawe made their hay with two-enders in both the sixth and ninth.
Last rock in the 11th end was really the difference. Simard put her first behind some guards but beyond the tee line and Fanshawe skip Kaitlyn Poirier – who had a team-high shooting percentage of 79 per cent – froze on top of it.
The MacEwan skip was unable to repeat the magic of the 10th end in her attempt to freeze on top of that one and the match ended.
So, the Griffins will play for the bronze medal on Wednesday (12 p.m.) against a familiar foe. The cross-town rival NAIT Ooks lost in the other semifinal – 6-3 to Camosun – setting up another rematch between the teams that have a ton of history.
Their last meeting was fairly recent – a 6-5 NAIT win in the opening draw of the CCAA nationals last Saturday. Last month they also met in an important game – the semifinal at the ACAC Championship – and the Griffins scored a 10-5 triumph.
In any event, the one game the Griffins were hoping to have back was their loss to NAIT here this week, especially since they were up 5-3 heading into the ninth only to concede three points over the final two ends.
"When you lose to a team, sometimes it gives you a little more motivation," noted Kitagawa, using the Fanshawe semifinal as an example after the Griffins lost to the same team 9-5 earlier in the day. "We lost to Fanshawe this morning and we didn't curl anywhere near as well. If we curled the way we did tonight and they curled at the level they did we probably would have won that."
Fanshawe and Camosun will meet for the gold medal at the same time as MacEwan and NAIT.
