Inside Story – A Coach’s View

Coach - Matt Sagle

Team - Scott Sagle, Alex Sinclair, Kevin Sagle, Cailen Arnold.

We were in London this week, along with several other Manotick and Ottawa area teams. It is a pretty grueling trip, and means some school is missed by curlers, time taken off work for parents and coaches, as well as the expense of traveling to and staying in London, for 3 days.  I'm pretty sure that I am not the only person heading back to Ottawa on Sunday afternoon, faced with that 6 - 7 hour trip, wondering why we do it each year.

I guess the answer is that the kids love it, and they get a chance to play in a very competitive spiel along with some 50 other teams from across the Province and Quebec. The spiel is set up so that everyone gets 5 games to find their own level before entering the play-offs. Every game is crucial to the final standings, so the kids all know they have to focus and be at their best every game out. This makes for great curling and a great learning experience for the curlers

In our pool, it was so competitive that, when throwing final rocks in our 5th game, we still had the opportunity to end up 2nd in our pool, or drop to 5th.  Luckily we managed to win our 3rd out of 5 games, and came in 2nd. Then we went into the 2nd level pool for the play offs, but lost in the semis, to Tim March of Annendale. 

Our most exiting game was an extra end loss to one of the best teams in the Province (Cody Mause). The score was 9-8 in what looked like a new NHL game - lots of offence, but little defense.

Coach – Graham Sinclair

Team – Neil Sinclair, Graham Rathwell, Andrew Hamilton, Tom Clement

Team Sinclair is currently ranked 9th on the Ontario Junior Curling Tour. Check out all the details at http://www.curlingrocks.com/ojct/seed.php