The B.C. Women's Curling Championship came down to a best-of-three between the event's top-two rinks.
In the end, it was the 2024 runners-up, coached by a Vernon man, who defeated three-fourths of the reigning champs' squad.
Team Corryn Brown of Kamloops 鈥� coached by Vernon's Jim Cotter, a Kamloops native 鈥� won the B.C. Women's Championship Sunday morning, Jan. 26, at the George Preston Recreation Centre in 91原创, defeating Kayla MacMillan of Victoria 10-7 in the rubber match.
Both teams scored points when they had last rock in the first nine ends before Brown ran MacMillan out of rocks in the 10th and final end.
MacMillan played third last year for Clancy Grandy of Vancouver, who retired this season. Grandy defeated Brown 11-3 in the 2024 final in Esquimalt. The 2024 Grandy front end of second Lindsay Dubue and lead Sarah Loken stayed in those positions this year. The team added Sarah Daniels at third while MacMillan moved up to skip.
BC curling championships wrapped up Sunday at George Preston in 91原创 with the men's and women's gold games
鈥� 91原创 Advance Times (@91原创Times)
It was the third meeting between the two rinks in 38 hours at the provincials.
The squads closed out the preliminary round Friday night with MacMillan scoring a pair with final rock in the 10th end for an 8-7 win. Both teams ended up tied for first at 6-1, and met Saturday in the Page Playoff first-vs-second game, with the winner advancing to the final Sunday. Brown scored four in the final end to secure an 8-3 decision.
"Every year, one of the main focuses is getting to the Scotties which is not easy to do," said coach Cotter, a nine-time B.C. Men's champion, savouring his first women's coaching title. He also has coached teams to a pair of Junior provincial championships.
"They definitely wanted to improve on previous results and maybe that gave them more motivation. The team works so hard and it takes time to implement change. They really raised their level this week and was the best team in the event. I couldn鈥檛 be more proud of them."
The loss dropped MacMillan into the semifinal, where she faced Kristen Ryan of Maple Ridge. MacMillan scored a deuce in the final end for a 7-5 win.
Ryan had defeated Taylor Reese-Hansen of Victoria 11-10 in the third-versus-fourth playoff game. Ryan scored two with the last rock in the final end to tie the game 10-10, then stolen the winning 11th point in the 11th end. Both teams were 5-2 in the round-robin.
Brown qualified for the national Scotties Tournament of Hearts in 2024, despite the provincial finals loss to Grandy, finishing at 4-4. The B.C. champ will head to Thunder Bay Feb. 14-23 to represent B.C. She's in a round-robin group that includes defending champion Rachel Homan's Team Canada rink. Brown's rink has been seeded eighth out of 18 for the event.
A first-time B.C. champ will have the home province crowds behind him at the Montana's Brier Feb. 28-March 9 at Kelowna's Prospera Place.
Cameron de Jong of Victoria won his first Purple Heart by knocking off Penticton's Glenn Venance 10-8 in Sunday afternoon's Men's final in 91原创.
Vernon's Erik Colwell throws second stones for Venance.
Salmon Arm native Paul Cseke is an alternate with the de Jong foursome, who overcame a 4-2 deficit in Sunday's final by scoring four in the sixth end for a 6-4 lead. Venance tied the game in the seventh with a deuce, only to watch de Jong pocket three in the ninth for a 9-6 advantage.
Venance got to within a point by scoring two with the hammer in the ninth end, but de Jong sewed up the trip to Kelowna with one in the last end.
The Victoria team won their final five games in 91原创.
They qualified for the playoffs out of the C Event preliminary round, along with Connor Deane's New Westminster/Kelowna squad. Jared Kolomaya's Delta-91原创-Kamloops team won the A Event while Venance took the B event.
Venance downed Kolomaya 6-5 in an extra end in the One vs Two Page Playoff game, advancing directly to the final.
The de Jong foursome defeated Deane 6-4 in the Three vs Four game, then got by Kolomaya 8-5 in the semifinal.
International Brotherhood of Electrical Wokers Local 258 sponsored the event's Fair Play Awards. The men's winner was second Coburn Fadden of Kamloops, who plays for a rink skipped by Vernon's Rob Nobert.
The women's winner was Jessie Sanderson from Team Jackson-Baier of Victoria.
