(CCA) It wasn’t a great start for Northern Ontario’s Dale Dubinsky at the Dominion
Curling Club Championship in Richmond. B.C., but it’s shaping up to be a great
finish.
Championship (Photo: Yadranka Thompson and The Dominion)
Dubinsky, who stumbled out of the starting blocks in the men’s section by
losing his first two games of the competition, got his game together just in
time to rattle off four straight wins and now finds himself in a playoff
tiebreaker situation in the chase for the men’s club championship of Canada.
And if he can keep a hot hand, who knows what story he can fashion by the end
of the week.
Dubinsky, from Kakabeka Falls, a tourist community in the Lake of the Woods
region of eastern Ontario, stole a single in the ninth end to upset Dwight
Hodder of British Columbia Friday afternoon to move into a second-place tie in
the Grey Pool with Manitoba’s Barry Mandryk of Winnipeg. Mandryk lost his final
round-robin game, 6-1, to Alberta’s Wade Thurber, to fall into a deadlock with
Dubinsky, both with 4-2 records.
Hodder had a chance for the win in the ninth, but his attempt at a
double-takeout over-curled by a fraction of an inch, removing just one rock and
giving Dubinsky the win.
Alberta finished on top of the Grey Pool with a sparking 5-1 record.
The top two teams in each pool advance to the playoffs Saturday. The teams
cross over in the semifinals, with the first place team in one pool meeting the
second-place team in the other pool.
The second-place deadlock in the Grey Pool means Manitoba and Northern
Ontario will have to play a special tiebreaker game Friday evening, with the
winner advancing to the semifinals.
Dubinsky was one of the great comeback stories at this week’s competition.
Paul Harvey’s crew from Newfoundland & Labrador was the other. The boys from
The Rock looked down and out in their final Blue Pool game against Donald Clarey
of Prince Edward Island, trailing 6-4 coming home. But Clarey’s final delivery
of the end ‘picked’ and Harvey scored three points to emerge with a 7-6 win to
secure second place in the pool.
First place was wrapped up by Ontario’s Greg Balsdon of Richmond Hill who
disposed of Saskatchewan’s Brad Bibby 7-4 to finish atop the heap with an
unblemished 6-0 record.
The loss knocked Biddy out of the playoffs hunt with his second loss.
“It worked out quite well for us,” said Harvey. “It didn’t look good for us
earlier in the game. Sometimes you wonder. But my team reminded me that this how
we won many of our games in the provincials to get here, so just hang in
there.”
In a game that didn’t mean anything in the standings, but a lot for pride,
Quebec’s John Monroe defeated Nova Scotia’s Andrew Atherton 5-4 in the Blue Pool
for his first win of the competition.
In another game, New Brunswick’s Barry Lewis defeated Mel Sittichinli of the
Territories 6-4 in the Grey Pool.
The championship game goes at 2 p.m. local time (6 pm PEI time) Saturday.