North Grenville Curling Club Oct 26 -29
by Jim Dolan
Our town and our curling club are proud to host the 16th North Grenville Curling Club Women’s Fall Curling Classic from October 26 to October 29. The Fall Classic is a Women’s World Curling Tour Event. Teams will compete for $25,000 with the winning team taking home $6,500.
Curling fans will have the pleasure of watching one of the strongest fields in the event’s history.
Just how strong is the field? The Fall Classic’s 2022 Champion Isabelle Ladouceur (see photo) will have to be at her best if she is to make it to the Championship Game on Sunday. Standing in her way are excellent teams from Canada, including the Events 2018 Champion Kerry Galusha, Northern Ontario’s Krista McCarville and last year’s runner up, Ottawa’s Danielle Inglis, plus four international teams and two teams from the United States. Ten-time New Brunswick Scotties champion Andrea Kelly is playing third for McCarville.
For the first time in the event’s history the Club will welcome two teams from Korea and one from Italy. The Korean teams are skipped by Seungyoun Ha and EunJung Kim, who are the number 2 and 3 ranked teams in Korea. The Italian team is skipped by Stefania Constantini who won a Gold Medal in doubles at the 2022 Olympics. Japan’s Ikue Kitazawa is the third Japanese team to play in the Fall Classic. The United States teams are skipped by Sarah Anderson ranked number 2 in the US from Minneapolis Minnesota and Stephanie Senneker from Port Huron Michigan.
What makes the Fall Classic an exciting event to watch live are the unexpected upsets by a veteran senior team like Thurso Quebec’s Chantal Osborne or by the younger teams that represent the future of the women’s game in Canada, teams such as Winnipeg’s Kristy Watling, Ottawa’s Hailey Armstrong, St. John’s Newfoundland’s Sarah Boland (formerly Hill), and Montreal’s Laurie St-Georges. Three-time US National Champion, Jamie Sinclair of Manotick, has moved back home and will play third for St-Georges.
Upsets by these teams may provide easier routes for teams such as Ottawa’s Erin Morrissey (semi-finalist last year), Toronto’s Carly Howard and Timmins’s Lauren Mann to make it to Championship Sunday. Mann is a past member of our club.
The best way to find out what teams might surprise the favourites is to drop by the Club to support these amazing women athletes. If you do and want to add a little extra vocal support to your favourite team, you can dress a little warmer and sit in the bleachers closer to the ice surface.
Games run all day on Thursday starting at 9:15 am. The last draw is at 9:00 pm. Friday games start at 8:45 am, and the last draw is at 8:00 pm. On Saturday, games are at 9:00 am, 11:30 am, 4:00 pm and 7:00 pm. On Sunday, the quarter-finals, semi-finals and Championship games are at 9:00 am, 12:30 pm and 3:30 pm.
For the Complete listing of Teams, Games and Draw times, visit CurlingZone – Everything Curling, click on Events Women, scroll down to Week 14 and click on North Grenville Women’s Fall Classic.
A day pass costs only $10, a four-day event pass costs $25. Persons 17 and under are admitted free.
