The 2012 MJCT season has been a successful one for Kristy Watling and her team. The Watling team finished up the season not only at the top of the leader board in points, but as the 2012 MJCT junior women’s champions.
Watling and her team of Kristin Ambrozik, Kendra Derbowka and Leanne Klos defeated Selena Kaatz in the final 6-4. This is their second MJCT championship in a row.
This was the second time these teams faced each other in an MJCT championship game. Watling defeated Kaatz at the Stonewall Junior Classic, too.
Watling was down 4-3 in the seventh end with the hammer. Kaatz attempted a hit and roll into the four foot, however she only rolled for second shot. With the game guaranteed to be tied, Watling threw a hit and stick for three to win the game.
“We feel very fortunate. We had to play some great teams along the way and definitely had our share of breaks,” Watling said.
One of those “breaks” Watling refers to is Kaatz’s first skip rock. It picked right out of her hand and left Watling with a draw to the 12-foot to block a potential draw on Kaatz’s next shot.
Watling won six straight games to claim the championship. She claimed first in her pool by going 4-0. She defeated Jessica Rutter, Rebecca Lamb, Alyssa Vandepoele and Kayla Curtis.
The win has put Watling and her team in good spirits, especially with provincials right around the corner.
“It’s a good feeling going into provincials, but with curling anything can happen, so we are going to take it one game at a time with no firm expectations,” she said.
She also isn’t taking the competition lightly. To win the MJCT championship, Watling and her rink had to defeat Kaatz and Birchard, both whom represented Team Manitoba last year.
“It shows that we can win if we play our game. But we have to be at our best to win since it does make us realize we can compete if we play our best because the teams we play are really good,” she said.
On the junior men’s side, Cole Peters emerged victorious, defeating MJCT points leader Matt Dunstone not once, but twice.
Peters defeated Dunstone 7-3 in seven ends in the final.
“It felt great to get the win over Dunstone because they are such a skilled and consistent team,” Peters said.
Peters and his team of Connor McIntyre, Nick Good and Robbie Gordon played in the same pool as Dunstone. Both teams were 3-0 before meeting in the final round-robin game. Peters defeated Dunstone 6-3.
Peters limited Dunstone’s scoring to a single in the third end and two points in the fifth. Peters strung together a strong second-half of the game. After giving up the deuce in the fifth, they scored one in the sixth and stole another in the seventh to seal the deal.
Peters left Dunstone with a draw against two. Dunstone came up short and only beat one of them to the pin.
The biggest thing for Peters was to not let Dunstone get ahead in either of those games.
“We knew we couldn’t get down big because they are really good at peeling,” he said.
Just like Watling, Peters believes this kind of momentum in December is huge.
“I feel that this win was a big momentum boost for our team because we know how well we can play and that if we are consistent we can contend with any team,” he said.
Peters noted his team worked on communication and staying positive in any situation.
“We all played pretty well this weekend but I still think we need to work on focusing on the shot at hand and to not get too ahead of ourselves during an end,” Peters said. “We’ve grown a lot as a team this year and this win also helped us realize how much we’ve improved.”
Peters defeated Curtis Kaatz, Ty Dillelo, Tanner Lott and Matt Dunstone in the round robin. They also defeated Randy Greig in the semi-finals.
