It was only fitting two of the young pillars of the Okotoks curling community squared off on home ice in the final of the Alberta Junior Curling Tour Player’s Championship.
The Okotoks Curling Club’s Kyler Kleibrink rink won the Player’s Championship final 6-3 over Calgary’s Scott Smith rink, which featured Okotoks Junior Curling Academy coach Taylor Ardiel at second, March 11 in Okotoks.
Kleibrink was curling with a dizzying case of the flu, along with Colin Peterson at third, James Keats filling in at second and Christian Sprinkhuysen at lead.
The skip said the strategy against Smith was to build an early lead and clear out the ice of any would be guards or blockers.
“Just try to get up and then hit, hit, hit everything,” Kleibrink said. “It just really helped to put our rocks in the right spot.”
After a blank first end, Kleibrink picked up a three-ender in the second end after using his hammer to slide his yellow rock past a pair of Smith guards. Kleibrink looked poised to double his lead in the third end, but Smith executed a hit-and-stick to steal one.
Kleibrink regained the three-point lead with a single in the fourth. Smith picked up two points with the hammer in the fifth end to make it a tight 4-3 lead for Kleibrink.
However, the Okotokian furthered his advantage in the sixth end when he hit the button with Smith sitting two and then added a single in the seventh end for the 6-3 win.
Ardiel said the final came down to a few missed shots from the Smith rink.
“We were missing on the right side in the (seventh end) where we came up light and gave them a steal, we just about made it around their guard and we wrecked on the guard and gave up our chance for two or three,” Ardiel said. “It’s a game of inches and it’s the way it goes.”
The Smith rink had its way over Kleibrink’s team this curling season, with just one loss to the Okotoks curlers all year, but could not pull it out in the final.
“Anyone can have a bad game, it just happens,” Ardiel said.
Kleibrink’s teammates finished with a 2-1 record in round-robin play, including a 5-4 win over Smith with Geoff Nicholson filling in at skip on March 10, and qualified for the playoff round. Then Kleibrink fought through a serious bout of the flu to step on the ice for the final day of competition.
His opponent when he returned to the Okotoks Curling Club was one of the tournament favourites, the Dylan Webster rink out of Sundre.
Kleibrink built an early lead on Webster through three ends before the Sundre skip had to bow out with a knee injury after the fourth end. The Okotoks curlers would add a double and single end to close out the match with an impressive 6-0 victory.
“We just really put it to them and stole five ends in a row,” Kleibrink said. “We just got them down and they didn’t really comeback too well.”
Kleibrink said the home ice advantage, gleaned from curling at their own rink, allowed him to successfully enter the tournament more than half way through competition.
“I think it was a really big advantage because I didn’t play Friday or Saturday and I could still come in sort of knowing the ice,” Kleibrink said.
Ardiel said he was pleased with the tournament performance of the Smith rink through the three days of competition. Smith advanced to the tournament final on the strength of round robin wins over Calgary’s Spencer Higgs, Edmonton’s Andrew Schiller and a semifinal come-from-behind 5-2 victory over Dylan Theroux out of Edmonton.
“For being down three out of our five games and being able to comeback and pull off wins just by stealing points, it’s nice to comeback,” Ardiel said. “For our team I’m proud of ourselves, we fought back through most of the games.”
The Okotoks Junior Curling Academy coach said it was disappointing to not walk away with the player’s championship trophy on home ice.
“There’s next year,” Ardiel said. “Definitely we’ll be back on the tour again to have another run at it.”
The women’s final featured a battle of Edmonton rinks from the Saville Sports Centre. In a seesaw game with various lead changes, Kelsey Rocque edged Karynn Flory 9-8 in extra ends. The winners of the Junior Curling Tour Player’s Championship walked away with a $1,000 cash prize as well as custom brooms, the second place finishers won $700 and those in third and fourth place took home $400.
For more information on the Alberta Junior Curling Tour visit www.albertajuniorcurlingtour.com.
