What does it hold for curling? I don't really know but it will be fun to see where social media takes the game of curling in the next 5 years. Facebook is a great way to start a group to share photos, create events and a whole slew of other goodies. I am slowly but surely adding more people to follow on twitter everyday and there are some great tweets out there. @fakekevinmartin made the airwaves as he or she was mentioned during one of the brier playoff broadcasts. There is no truer form if flattery than a copy cat. Youtube often gets overlooked as a social media but is just as big as facebook and twitter.
What will be interesting to see is if teams & players will indulge themselves and fans with social media. Mike McEwen and his rink already have a twitter account(@mcewencurling). Go there for team updates that I am sure will be a bit more quite during the off season.
A big round of applause to the Manitoba boys of Jeff Stoughton, Jon Mead, Reid Carruthers & Steve Gould for bring home Manitoba's 27th Brier championship. The final against Glenn Howard was one of the most complete games I have ever seen. To Glenn Howard's credit his team played great and on most days he would have won the final. Howard just ran into a team that would not be defeated on that Sunday. The difference in that game was the steal of 2 for Stoughton in the 6th end which ended up being the difference as Stoughton would run Howard out of rocks in the 10th. This was a great moment for Manitoba and curling. Manitoba is still the capital of the world when it comes to curling, slurpees and mosquitos. Curling needs Manitoba as much as Manitoba needs curling. Through out the years the two have grown a symbiotic relationship where they thrive off each other. Some great tuckers and personalities have come from the Bison province such as Stoughton, Mead, Peters, Don and Doug Duguid. Good Luck to Team Canada in Regina in a couple weekends.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
The Scotties
It was a great week of curling in Charlottetown with many great stories. We have a new champion, a phenomenal young team from Ontario & and we had former teammates face off in one of the highest rated Scotties game in history. After all the dust had settled Amber Holland and her of Kim Schneider, Tammy Schneider & Heather Kalenchuk will represent Canada at the upcoming Ford World Curling Championship in Esbjerg, Denmark as well return to be Team Canada at the 2012 Scotties Tournament of Hearts.
Rachel Homan stepped into the spotlight and made it all the way to the semifinal before bowing out to Amber Holland. One of the weird introductions in this year's Scotties was the bronze medal game. The loser of the semi-final would play the loser of the 3 vs 4 page playoff game. Homan was the deserving winner of the bronze medal after beating Heather Smith-Dacey of Nova Scotia in the 3 vs 4 playoff game. Smith-Dacey would end up beating Homan in their rematch in the bronze medal game.
I think TSN persuaded the CCA to add the bronze medal game for one more game to make more money. For TSN the bronze medal game makes sense but it makes no sense for the curlers. If you have lost the semi-final do you really want to come back to play for bronze medal?? I didn't think so. I hope the CCA squashes this game in the future because it is a blatant cash grab.
Perhaps the biggest storyline headed into the Scotties would be the first game between Cathy Overton-Clapham and Jennifer Jones since Overton-Clapham was released from Jones' team. Overton-Clapham's Manitoba team faltered early and carried a 2-6 record into the match up on Wednesday night with Jones. It was one of the best games I had seen in a long time and was glad to see Overton-Clapham curled an amazing 92% in the win over Jones and made a spectacular double to win.
Stayed tuned for some posts during the Brier.
Rachel Homan stepped into the spotlight and made it all the way to the semifinal before bowing out to Amber Holland. One of the weird introductions in this year's Scotties was the bronze medal game. The loser of the semi-final would play the loser of the 3 vs 4 page playoff game. Homan was the deserving winner of the bronze medal after beating Heather Smith-Dacey of Nova Scotia in the 3 vs 4 playoff game. Smith-Dacey would end up beating Homan in their rematch in the bronze medal game.
I think TSN persuaded the CCA to add the bronze medal game for one more game to make more money. For TSN the bronze medal game makes sense but it makes no sense for the curlers. If you have lost the semi-final do you really want to come back to play for bronze medal?? I didn't think so. I hope the CCA squashes this game in the future because it is a blatant cash grab.
Perhaps the biggest storyline headed into the Scotties would be the first game between Cathy Overton-Clapham and Jennifer Jones since Overton-Clapham was released from Jones' team. Overton-Clapham's Manitoba team faltered early and carried a 2-6 record into the match up on Wednesday night with Jones. It was one of the best games I had seen in a long time and was glad to see Overton-Clapham curled an amazing 92% in the win over Jones and made a spectacular double to win.
Stayed tuned for some posts during the Brier.
Sunday, February 13, 2011
The Final We All Wanted
Charlsewood's Jeff Stoughton is joined by Assiniboine Memorial's Mike McEwen in the championship final of the 2011 Safeway Championship final in Beausejour today. McEwen defeated Terry McNamee of Brandon in the semi-final 6-3 earlier this morning.
This is the final everybody wanted to see. This is a rematch of a year ago when Stoughton beat McEwen 9-8 in an extra end. McEwen was appointed the number 1 seed by his peers after a very successful cash season which included 2 grand slam wins. Stoughton is the defending champion with Steve Gould back at lead, new member Reid Carruthers at second and returning to the team at third Jon Mead.
You can catch this game right now on Shaw TV or logging into www.safewaychampionship.ca
This is the final everybody wanted to see. This is a rematch of a year ago when Stoughton beat McEwen 9-8 in an extra end. McEwen was appointed the number 1 seed by his peers after a very successful cash season which included 2 grand slam wins. Stoughton is the defending champion with Steve Gould back at lead, new member Reid Carruthers at second and returning to the team at third Jon Mead.
You can catch this game right now on Shaw TV or logging into www.safewaychampionship.ca
LIVE CHAT RIGHT NOW
Visiti the front page of The Last Rock Rock blog to chat and get some insight into the semi-final and final today with myself. If you want to stream the game live on your computer visit http://www.safewaychampionship.ca/.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Page Playoff and Live Chat
There are six teams left battling it out for the chance to represent Manitoba at this year’s Tim Hortons Brier. We know that either defending champion Jeff Stoughton of Charlsewood or Brandon’s Terry McNamee will be playing in tomorrow’s championship final. Both Stoughton and McNamee won two games in the playoff round to advance to the 1 versus 1 game of the page playoff tonight at 6:30 on Shaw. The loser will drop the semi-final to play against one of four teams. Either Fort Garry’s Vic Peters, Brandon’s Rob Fowler, Assiniboine Memorial’s Mike McEwen or La Salle’s Randy Neufeld. As we speak McEwen is playing Neufeld and Fowler is facing off against Peters.
I often have misconceptions of how games are played out that I don’t see. McNamee defeated McEwen earlier today by a score of 9-4. When I arrived at the Sun Gro Centre in Beausejour Resby Coutts informed me that those two teams were tied 4-4 playing the ninth end. McNamee went on to score a 5 ender and defeat McEwen 9-4. I was not too surprised to hear that the game had been a close affair. Not many teams can blow out McEwen in a few ends.
I will be hosting a chat room on my blog for tomorrow morning’s semi-final and final. Please come online and login while I give some play-by-play and analysis. Both games will be streamed live on the Safeway Championship website.
I often have misconceptions of how games are played out that I don’t see. McNamee defeated McEwen earlier today by a score of 9-4. When I arrived at the Sun Gro Centre in Beausejour Resby Coutts informed me that those two teams were tied 4-4 playing the ninth end. McNamee went on to score a 5 ender and defeat McEwen 9-4. I was not too surprised to hear that the game had been a close affair. Not many teams can blow out McEwen in a few ends.
I will be hosting a chat room on my blog for tomorrow morning’s semi-final and final. Please come online and login while I give some play-by-play and analysis. Both games will be streamed live on the Safeway Championship website.
Friday, February 11, 2011
Corey Chambers and Stu Shiels Interview
Corey expresses his thoughts on his first Safeway Championship and Stu talks about his injury what kept him from curling in the Safeway Championship.
How many teams can really win the Brier?
I am currently watching B qualifying games at the Sun Gro Centre in Beausejour when the thought of how many teams can win the Brier? It is a very interesting question indeed and it makes you think that it could be less than a handful. The Olympics have changed our game forever where teams pay more attentions to of ice training than ever before.
Three teams are automatic that could win the brier: Kevin Martin, Glenn Howard and Kevin Koe. The last person other than those three to have his name engraved on the tankard was Jean-Michel Menard of Quebec. Interestingly enough Menard defeated Glenn Howard of the final that year. Howard's team has now played in the last 4 out of 5 Brier finals which is a phenomenal accomplishment for a team. In the year that he did not make the final he lost to Jeff Stoughton in the semi-final.
Now to consider the teams that are in the discussion that has the ability to win the Brier: Mike McEwen, Jeff Stoughton, Wayne Middaugh, Pat Simmons, and Brad Gushue. Mike McEwen is probably the one team that you could sandwich in between the first and second tiers. I left off Randy Ferbey’s old team because they have taken a break from curling.
Let us take a step outside the box and imagine that all the previous listed all qualified for the Brier from different provinces. We will take all of the teams at their current skill and commitment levels. The Brier then would be played out one hundred times and we would see how many different teams would win. I would guess that at least ninety out of those one hundred Briers would be won the likes of Martin, Howard, Koe & McEwen.
It may seem like a staggering number that I am guessing these four teams would win ninety percent of the Briers but that is just the case. These four teams off ice work are well documented in the media and the results prove that it is paying off. Until curlers are 100% dedicated to their sport and not have to worry about working their will be no parody in Curling. Over the next 3-5 years many of the curling elite will retire from competitive curling and that is when we will be seeing the changing of the guard. John Morris, Brad Gushue & Mike McEwen are becoming the next Kevin Martin, Glenn Howard & Jeff Stoughton of the world. The next generation of young curlers will put even more into training than the teams today. Depending on the number of people that take up intense training will determine how much parody there is in curling.
Three teams are automatic that could win the brier: Kevin Martin, Glenn Howard and Kevin Koe. The last person other than those three to have his name engraved on the tankard was Jean-Michel Menard of Quebec. Interestingly enough Menard defeated Glenn Howard of the final that year. Howard's team has now played in the last 4 out of 5 Brier finals which is a phenomenal accomplishment for a team. In the year that he did not make the final he lost to Jeff Stoughton in the semi-final.
Now to consider the teams that are in the discussion that has the ability to win the Brier: Mike McEwen, Jeff Stoughton, Wayne Middaugh, Pat Simmons, and Brad Gushue. Mike McEwen is probably the one team that you could sandwich in between the first and second tiers. I left off Randy Ferbey’s old team because they have taken a break from curling.
Let us take a step outside the box and imagine that all the previous listed all qualified for the Brier from different provinces. We will take all of the teams at their current skill and commitment levels. The Brier then would be played out one hundred times and we would see how many different teams would win. I would guess that at least ninety out of those one hundred Briers would be won the likes of Martin, Howard, Koe & McEwen.
It may seem like a staggering number that I am guessing these four teams would win ninety percent of the Briers but that is just the case. These four teams off ice work are well documented in the media and the results prove that it is paying off. Until curlers are 100% dedicated to their sport and not have to worry about working their will be no parody in Curling. Over the next 3-5 years many of the curling elite will retire from competitive curling and that is when we will be seeing the changing of the guard. John Morris, Brad Gushue & Mike McEwen are becoming the next Kevin Martin, Glenn Howard & Jeff Stoughton of the world. The next generation of young curlers will put even more into training than the teams today. Depending on the number of people that take up intense training will determine how much parody there is in curling.
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