The finals go at 6 this evening at the Credit Unions of PEI/Curl PEI Provincial Seniors Curling Championships at the Silver Fox Curling & Yacht Club in Summerside. The men’s championship game will see Summerside native Rod MacDonald and his combined Charlottetown Curling Complex/Silver Fox team take on the Bill Hope foursome from the Cornwall Curling Club and the Fox, while the host club’s Nola Murphy rink will take on the defending champion Shirley Berry squad from the Cornwall and Silver Fox clubs.

MacDonald, whose team, which includes John Likely, Mark O’Rourke, and Rod’s brother Peter MacDonald, has won a combined total of 23 PEI men’s titles over the years,  went through round robin play with a perfect 5-0 win-loss record to earn a bye to the final, while Hope, who won the Seniors in 2011, and is playing with Ted MacFadyen, Craig Mackie and David Murphy,  beat Summerside’s Blair Jay foursome 9-4 in this afternoon’s semi-final to advance to tonight’s game. Hope took a triple in the first ends, and stole the fourth and 7th ends in a 9-4 win. MacDonald beat Hope 9-6 in their round robin encounter.

In the triple-knockout women’s division, five-time Seniors champ Berry, whose team includes Sandy Hope, Shelley Ebbett, and Arleen Harris, beat the Jennifer Scott rink from Montague 8-1 in the semi-final this afternoon, stealing two singles and a triple en route to the win. Berry won the Page C-D game on Sunday, 9-3 over Montague’s Kathy Clarey.

Scott, whose current team won the PEI women’s championship back in 1988, went 3-0 in the triple knockout, advancing to the Page A-B game, where they lost 10-2 to Murphy to drop down to this afternoon’s semi-final, while Murphy advanced directly to the final.

Murphy’s rink from the Silver Fox includes Donna Arsenault, Elspeth Carmody, and Laurie McCabe.

The winners of this evening’s finals between MacDonald and Hope, and between Murphy and Berry. will advance to the Canadian Seniors, March 16-24, also at Summerside’s Silver Fox Curling & Yacht Club.