Two rinks with very different backstories earned the final provincial berths from the SaskTel Men’s Provincial Northern Qualifier Sunday afternoon.
Lashburn’s Ryan Armstrong and Saskatoon’s Scott Bitz both earned their tickets to the tankard, which will take place in Tisdale from Feb. 1 to 5, following dramatic 6-5 ‘C’ event wins at the Twin Rivers Curling Club.
Armstrong, who is joined on his rink by third Mike Robson, second Tyson Armstrong and lead Allen Dmytryshyn, needed a draw to the four-foot on his final shot in the tenth end to defeat Wadena’s Scott Comfort.
“When the year began, our goal was to make the provincials,” Armstrong said. “We’re a second-year team and we’ve made a lot of progress, especially after we got used to having Allen as our new lead.
“This will be my first time at provincials and I’m really looking forward to it.”
The key difference in a back-and-forth affair came in the eighth end, when Armstrong picked up three points to take a 5-4 lead.
“We played a really good end in the sixth but I was heavy on a draw that would have given us two points, and then I left Scott an easy shot for two in the seventh,” Armstrong said.
“We didn’t have anything going in the eighth until our third (Robson) made a really good shot on his. Scott’s last shot ran a little straight on him, so we were a little bit fortunate to have a shot at three. I made sure to tell the guys though that I wasn’t going to miss another draw before I shot it.
Meanwhile on the other sheet, Bitz also drew to the four-foot on his final shot to edge out fellow Sutherland Curling Club member Tyler Travis.
“Our weekend was kind of here and there,” Bitz said. “We had some good ends where we built up some momentum, but then we had some other ends that were kind of disastrous, but that’s how curling goes some times.
“We got off to a good start and I felt like we were controlling things really well, but we had couple of rocks pick on us in the fourth and eighth end, which was unfortunate. The same thing happened on their last as well in the tenth, otherwise I would have had a much more difficult shot on my final shot. However, it was an evenly matched game and we had a chance to win on the last shot of the game, which is what we were hoping for.”
Bitz, who won a provincial title as a skip in 2002 and was the third on Joel Jordison’s championship rink in 2009, had a slightly different squad than usual this weekend.
While he was joined by his regular third Warren Jackson and second Aryn Schmidt, Jayden Shwaga was filling in at lead for Dean Kleiter.
“Dean’s coaching his son Rylan this week at the Canadian Juniors out in British Columbia, so were lucky enough to have his nephew Jayden join us,” Bitz said.
“I guess we’ll have to discuss what the lineup will be at the provincials in a couple of weeks, but we’ll wait and see how the guys do at juniors first and we’ll go from there.”
Armstrong and Bitz joined Drew Heidt’s North Battleford rink and Brady Sharback’s Saskatoon foursome in earning provincial berths at the event.
The Southern Qualifier also took place on the weekend in Assiniboia, with the coveted tankard spots going to Estevan’s Brent Gedak and Regina’s Jason Ackerman.
A total of 16 rinks will be in Tisdale for the provincials, with the winner representing Saskatchewan at the Tim Hortons Brier in St. John’s, N.L. from March 4 to 12.
