Local Vivier & Acres rinks emerge 2-0 after frightful first contests at U18 curling nationals

By Dan Plouffe

The two local women’s teams both survived heart-stopping opening matches and then had an easier evening Monday at the RA Centre to begin the Canadian Under-18 Curling Championships with matching 2-0 records.

The Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club rink of Sydney Anderson, Toula Pappas, Brooklyn Ideson and skip Dominique Vivier is tied with British Columbia atop the Pool B standings, while the Ontario-2 team of Mya Sharpe, Isabella McLean, Aila Thompson and skip Ava Acres of the RCMP Curling Club lead Pool A alongside New Brunswick.

Team Vivier held the upper hand throughout their evening contest with Northern Ontario-2 and pulled away with consecutive triples in the sixth and seventh ends for a 9-2 victory.

The win was far more comfortable than their debut the previous afternoon when they went back-and-forth with Prince Edward Island. Vivier gave up a steal of two in the seventh end to fall behind 5-3, but then scored a deuce in the eighth and stole two more in the extra end to prevail 7-5.

“I don’t think I’m ever going to be breathing any easier,” Vivier said when asked if the second game felt any less stressful. “I told the girls after our first match, like, ‘OK, I’m done, I’m going home.'”

She said the key to surviving their opening tilt was the team’s mentality that “after you miss, you really have to make that next shot. And that was one of our goals for the match – make after we miss – and we really did that.”

The rink from the Championships co-host Hunt Club got to take centre-stage Monday night, mik’ed up for the featured match of Curling Canada’s broadcast.

“We were really excited to play this game,” Vivier indicated. “And because we’re the hometown team, we get like 10 times the fans, so it’s really nice to have all that support.”

Though the nationals are in Ottawa, three of the four team members had to travel into Ottawa – Vivier from Kitchener (where she studies at Wilfrid Laurier University), Ideson (who’s at Western University) from London, and Pappas from Peterborough (Trent University) – while Anderson had a shorter trip from Greely.

With different home bases and their school schedules, Team Vivier hasn’t got to spend much time practicing together outside of competitions, but they did arrange some team-bonding weekends, which included Starbucks trips and escape rooms to reenact a curling environment where they need to find solutions under pressure.

So, are they escape room champions as well as curling champs?

“No. We actually did really bad,” Vivier laughed. “But I still think those weekends really helped. We’re doing really well considering the lack of time that we spend together.”

Team Vivier won the Ontario championship in mid-January in Ottawa to earn their berth at nationals. Their objectives at provincials were primarily process-oriented, while their main performance goal was to make the playoffs, and then once they achieved that, they went for the win.

“Now that we’re at nationals, we want to make the playoffs, and then we’ll set another goal,” Vivier highlighted.

Team Acres reels off comeback in opener, cruises in game 2

The other local women’s entry has enjoyed a similar start to their nationals.

Facing Alberta in their first match Monday morning, Team Acres gave up back-to-back steals to trail 4-1 at the halfway point. They then scored just one with hammer in the fifth end, but managed to steal a point in three consecutive ends to prevail 5-4.

“(Alberta) were a very strong team. We came out pretty strong, but kind of lost our mojo in the middle a little, and then got it back for a few steals in the end,” reported Acres. “We know we’re a really good comeback team. Even if we’re down, we don’t let ourselves get down, we always bring each other back up.”

Facing Northern Ontario in the evening draw, Team Acres “came out really strong and put the pressure on them really early” to gain a 5-0 advantage after three ends en route to a 9-1 final in just six ends.

“It’s been a fun day,” added Acres, who claimed Ontario’s second nationals berth at the provincials, which featured a total of five Ottawa teams out of the eight that qualified.

Like they did at provincials when they rented an airbnb so they could all stay next to the host RCMP Curling Club, Team Acres again elected to treat nationals like an away tournament of sorts to eliminate distractions. They’re staying at a hotel like the visiting teams, but they do get to enjoy some home cooking since RCMP club manager Paul Adams is letting them use his house at mealtimes.

“It’s great (to play in Ottawa). We have a lot of family that can come out and watch, which is great since it’s our home province and our hometown,” underlined Acres, whose main goal for nationals is to make the playoffs.

“I think if we keep playing how we’ve been playing, that’s pretty achievable,” she added. “And our highest goal is to medal.”

In the men’s competition, the Ontario-2 team of Kole O’Connor, Tye McCutcheon, Drew Zettler, and skip Owen Nicholls of the Rideau Curling Club were 1-2 through the second day of play.

Team Nicholls – who came out to cheer on their Ontario counterparts Monday evening – started off with a 9-3 win over Northern Ontario, then fell 8-7 to Prince Edward Island and 9-4 to Saskatchewan.

Pool play continues until Thursday morning at both the RA Centre and Ottawa Hunt & Golf Club. The top four of seven teams from each of the three pools will then move on to the playoff round, with the finals taking place on Saturday.

The full schedule is available via curling.ca/scoreboard.