Rocks were flying all over the ice at the Humboldt Curling Club from Jan. 8-10 as the Goldline Saskatchewan Players Championship came to town.
The Bonspiel hosted teams ranked 2 through 17 in the province.
The Goldline Saskatchewan Players Championship was the last chance for teams to gain an automatic berth to provincials through winning the event and their last chance to gain valuable Curling Team Ranking System (CTRS) points.
The tournament started on Friday night with a full slate of action and continued through to Sunday afternoon where Muenster native, Bruce Korte’s Saskatoon rink beat Shaun Meachem’s Saskatoon rink 7-1 in six ends in the final.
Korte was pleased with how his team performed especially during the final day of action.
“I thought we really got our game together today. We played good yesterday but today we thought we brought our A game and we were playing really well,” he said.
“It was a great field, you look at the teams here we had pretty much all the tops teams except Laycock here so it was a fabulous field and we had to play good to win so we’re pretty pleased,” he added.
Despite the loss, Shaun Meachem’s rink earned the final guaranteed spot at provincials due to Korte’s rink already having a provincial berth thanks to their win at the Heritage Inn Moose Jaw Cash Spiel in December.
Meachem said his team was already guaranteed a spot at provincials as well through his CTRS points as he sat in second place but nonetheless he was still happy to have that spot.
“It’s a good feeling for sure,” he said.
Changing ice conditions played a factor for Meachem’s team in the final as Meachem said the team struggled with draw weight, something he said Korte’s team picked up on right away.
Despite the loss in the final Meachem was still pleased with how his team performed over the weekend.
“We always struggle at the start of spiels, so we are never surprised if we lose a game early in a spiel but we always bounce back and battle through and we made it to the final after being on our last life after our first game basically. It’s a good weekend when you can get to a final,” he said.
The Bonspiel featured shortened games with teams only playing to eight ends as opposed to ten, unless the teams were tied or the score warranted a concession of the match, which was what happened during the final after Korte’s rink scored three in the sixth end to push the lead to six.
Korte was not the only local talent curling in the event as Humboldt native Dustin Kalthoff was competing with Team Jacobson.
Jacobson lost to Korte’s rink 5-4 in extra ends in the semi-finals but due to their win last month at the Saskatoon Nutana Classic their spot at provincials had already been assured.
Kevin Kalthoff, head of the host committee, said that the event went really well and was well attended.
“We had all these tables up in the lounge here full for the semi-finals, downstairs was about half full it was really a lot of fun watching that semi-final. Everybody was really into it. There was a lot of clapping and everything and it’s nice to see,” he said.
Despite the Broncos playing during the middle of the tournament, Kalthoff did not think it affected turn-out too much.
“People were still coming here between periods and they were walking over to see what was all going on,” he said.
There are five berths to provincials awarded through the CTRS points as the top five teams that have not already qualified earn those spots.
Points are earned through either playing in Sask Curling Tour events or World Curling Tour events.
In the Sask Curling Tour, teams can only gain points by qualifying for the playoffs whereas the World Curling Tour events give you points for each victory earned. Points are also worth more during world events.
The Humboldt Curling Club is not done hosting provincial qualifiers as the ladies get their turn this coming weekend starting Jan. 15.
