The 2021 championship winning team of Isabelle Ladouceur (skip), Jamie Smith (vice), Lauren Rajala (second), Katie Shaw (lead) and Katy Lukowich (alternate) might be as far-reaching a crew as we’ve seen.
Though Smith and Rajala are well-known commodities within Sudbury curling circles, Ladouceur (Nova Scotia), Shaw (P.E.I.) and Lukowich (Manitoba) have complemented the accomplished local duo quite nicely.
Last weekend in Timmins, Team Ladouceur ran the table, posting a 4-0 mark in round-robin play before besting the Bella Croisier Curl Sudbury quartet (Julia Bakos, Emilie Lovitt, Piper Croisier) 10-6 in the final.
(L-R): Skip Isabelle Ladouceur, Third Jamie Smith, Second Lauren Rajala, Lead Katie Shaw, Alternate Katy Lukowich, Coach Steve Acorn
The youngest member of the team at just 18 years of age, Katie Shaw had crossed paths with her future teammates, dating back to U18 playdowns and other bonspiels out east.
“I met all three of them at the U18 nationals in St Andrews (New Brunswick) in 2018,” she said.
“I saw it as a great opportunity to play with some older curlers, girls with a lot of experience — and I was really excited that they asked me back this year.”
Her curling pedigree was unquestioned.
A talented skip in her younger days who slid back to vice to join Lexie Murray for a pair of trips to nationals representing P.E.I., Shaw sees the move to lead as only partially a move in a different direction.
“I would say that I was always more interested in the finesse game; I liked to throw that last draw (as a skip),” she said. “I think when you’re playing lead, it’s just a different kind of pressure.
“Instead of having to draw right at the very end of the end, you have to draw right at the beginning in order to start things off right.”
Recording three lopsided wins along the way likely eased the stress level for Ladouceur and company, though they tried to stay committed to maintaining an even keel throughout.
“One thing that we talked about a lot this week was patience,” suggested Shaw. “This was our first ten end event and a lot can happen in those extra two ends.
“If it so happened that the opposition scored a few points, we didn’t want to panic. If the game stayed tight, we wanted to stick to playing our game. We worked hard this fall and we were pretty confident that we could accomplish this.”