The Ontario University Athletics (OUA) Curling Championships were hosted by the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) Ridgebacks from Feb. 16-20.
The Carleton Ravens women’s curling team narrowly missed out on the podium, as they fell by a score of 7-6 against the University of Toronto Varsity Blues in the bronze medal game after finishing 6-1 in round robin play.
The Ravens men’s curling team, meanwhile, wrapped up round robin play with a 4-3 record, and lost to the Laurier Golden Hawks by a score of 6-5 in the quarterfinals.
“I can say I’m satisfied with the finish, but disappointed in another way because I think we had a good enough team that we probably could have finished at least second, and maybe won it,” Ravens women’s curling coach Jodi Horton said.
“The two teams that were in the final, we beat in the round robin, and the ice changed a little bit and our girls got a little bit fatigued as the week went on, and I just think we ran out of gas a little bit,” he said.
The Ravens had a hot start to the championship, winning their first six round robin games. In their final round robin game, however, the Ravens fell 5-2 to Laurier and finished in second in their pool with a 6-1 record.
Carleton then went up against Guelph in the quarterfinals, and won 7-4. In the semifinal, the Ravens took on the Ryerson Rams for the second time, but this time they fell by a score of 5-4.
The Ravens were forced to settle for the bronze medal game, but gave up two in the final end, and fell 7-6 to the Varsity Blues for a fourth-place finish.
“Our start at 6-0 was fantastic, and then we had a really good game and lost game seven in the round robin and then the girls came back out and had a great quarterfinal on Sunday evening and just came out a little bit flat on Monday and didn’t recover,” Horton said.
Ravens men’s curling coach Tom Sinclair said he believed the team played very well over the course of the week.
“We pushed [Laurier] all the way to the last rock, and they needed to execute a very precise shot to get the win, otherwise we would have advanced to the [semifinal] and would have had a shot at one of the three medal spots,” he said. “They played exceptionally well considering the fact that the team we were playing against was the eventual gold medalist.”
The Ravens opened the championships with a 5-4 win over Ryerson, and also defeated UOIT, the Guelph Gryphons, and the Laurentian Voyageurs.
After wrapping up the round robin with a 4-3 record, the Ravens took on Laurier in the quarterfinal, but fell 6-5, and were eliminated.
“The team played exceptionally well for the entire week earning the quarterfinal spot in a very tough pool, so it was a week of really good learning opportunities,” Sinclair said. “[W]e can now build to try and not only get to the quarters, but also to the semis and ultimately to the finals hopefully next year.”
– File photo
