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For the second consectutive year, the Thompson Rivers University WolfPack had to settle for a silver medal at the CIS national women’s curling championship.
In a rematch of the 2015 final, Corryn Brown of Kamloops fell 5-4 in 11 ends to defending champion Kelsey Rocque of the University of Alberta in the title match at the Kelowna Curling Club on Wednesday.
The Pandas and WolfPack swapped points in the first two ends, while Alberta added one in the third, sixth, 10th to force the extra end.
Considered the host team in the eight-rink playdown, Brown and teammates Erin Pincott (third), Samantha Fisher (second) and Ashley Nordin (lead) had earned a berth in the final by defeating the Dalhousie Tigers of Halifax 7-4 in Wednesday semifinals. That came on the heels of second-place finish in round-robin play with a 5-2 record.
Rocque, a two-time world junior championship skip, punched her ticket to the final by defeating the Guelph Gryphons 8-6 on Wednesday morning after finishing fourth in round-robin play, also with a 5-2 mark. Other members of the gold-medal team are Danielle Schmiemann (third), Taylor McDonald (second) and Taylore Theroux (lead.).
The U of A team will now represent Canada at the 2017 World University Games in Almaty, Kazakhstan.
Alberta’s men’s team, skipped by Thomas Scoffin, also reached the CIS final on Wednesday, but came out on the short end of a 7-4 decision to the Aaron Squires rink representing Wilfrid Laurier University Golden Hawks of Waterloo, Ont.
The Alberta Golden Bears had gone 7-0 in the eight-team round-robin portion of the national championship at the KCC and earned a berth in final by defeating fourth-place Victoria Vikes 6-4 in semifinal play Wednesday morning.
Wilfrid Laurier, 6-1 in round-robin play, tripled the Brock Badgers of St.Catharines, Ont. 9-3 in their semifinal. Squires and his team of Richard Krell (third), Spencer Nuttall (second) and Fraser Reid (lead), will join Rocque and company at the World University Games in Almaty.
Meanwhile, the host UBC Okanagan Heat, skipped by Justin Nillson (Colton Costa, Luke Cooke, Cam Mahler) had an opportunity to make the playoffs going into Tuesday’s action, but lost their final two round-robin matches — to Brock (8-2) and Dalhousie (8-5) to finish at 2-5 .
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