Reid Carruthers and his team from the West St. Paul Curling Club are headed back to the Brier.
Carruthers avenged last year’s loss in the final as they defeated Mike McEwen 7-6 in a championship game rematch at the Viterra Championship in Winkler. Carruthers claimed his fifth provincial men’s curling title and second as a skip after winning his first three titles with Jeff Stoughton.
“I was trying not to get too excited about playing in the final and the thoughts of getting to go to Regina and getting back to the Brier.” Carruthers said. “But I guess, after two years of McEwen winning and beating us and deserving to go obviously, for us it was one of those things where you had to work a little bit harder,”
“And I guess this tastes a little bit sweeter after not going for a few years.”
The final was the first game for McEwen since Wednesday after he was hospitalized with chickenpox.
After missing Sunday morning’s semifinal McEwen was released from the hospital in time to throw the third stones in the championship game. BJ Neufeld continued to toss the skip stones for Team McEwen like he did in McEwen’s absence.
“He’s been drugged and on IV’s,” Neufeld said.
“He’s weak, I mean, you know he’s got pox all over himself. I mean, he’s being pretty vulnerable just being here and I think playing the game itself, so he doesn’t really need this I guess.”
“It shows a lot about his character, his courage,” Carruthers said.
“To put himself out there after not playing and leaving it all on the line, it says a lot about the guy’s character.”
Carruthers and his team of third Braeden Moskowy, second Derek Samagalski, and lead Colin Hodgson stole a single point in the seventh end to go ahead 6-3 and the 2015 champs appeared to be well on their way to another title. Team McEwen had other ideas though and Neufeld made an open draw for a deuce in the eighth end and then Carruthers gave up a steal of one in the ninth end and suddenly the match was tied. But with the game on the line in the tenth end Carruthers made a nose hit for one to secure another provincial championship.
It was the fourth time in the last five years Carruthers has faced McEwen in the provincial final.
McEwen was making his fifth straight appearance in the championship game but they still have another chance to qualify for the Brier thanks to the recent format change. For the first time the Brier will have a play-in game and as the current leader in the CTRS (Canadian Team Ranking System) standings Team McEwen will have a second chance to advance to the Brier via the wild card game.
The wild card game kicks off the 2018 Brier on March 2 in Regina.
WATCH: Post Game Reaction
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