The Lou Nowlan rink from the Silver Fox curling club in Summerside beat the Clair Sweet foursome from the Maple Leaf Curling Club in O’Leary by a 6-2 score Friday evening to capture the first of three section qualifiers in the five-team men’s division of the PEI Masters Curling Championships, for curlers age 60 and over, being played at the Crapaud Community Curling Club. The Nowlan squad, which includes three members of last year’s winning team, will face the winner of a 10 am Saturday game between Sweet and Summerside’s Blair Jay in the 2 pm Saturday “B” Qualifier game (with the modified triple knockout format, section winners drop down to compete in the next section, and can win more than one section).
Lou Nowlan
In the “A” Qualifier, Nowlan had a 3-1 lead after four ends, but stole a deuce in the fifth and a single in the sixth for a big 6-1 lead. Sweet was kept to a single in seven and ran out of rocks in the eighth for a 6-2 final score. The Bill Hope rink from Cornwall and the Silver Fox and the Paul Arsenault squad from Cornwall are now in the “last chance” C event, and play in the 10 am Saturday draw with the loser being eliminated.
The “C Qualifying game goes Sunday at 2, with the two-game championship round going Monday at 10 am and, if necessary, 2 pm. If Nowlan were to win all three sections, the championship round would not be played. If a team wins 2 sections, they would advance to both championship games and win the title if they took either game, while their opponent, the other section winner, would have to win both,
The two team best of five women’s event between two Cornwall rinks, skipped by defending champion Sandy Hope, and by Shirley Berry, gets underway Saturday at 2 pm.
The winning and finalist men’s teams and both women’s rinks earn the right to compete in the Maritime Masters, at the Riverside Country Club March 15-17, in Rothesay NB, while the men’s and women’s winning teams, or finalist teams if they are unable to attend, also earn the right to compete in the 2019 College Clean Restoration Canadian Masters Curling Championships, April 1-7 at the Nutana Curling Club in Saskatoon SK.