Braden Calvert and his Fort Rouge team are a win away from their long dreamed about trip to the Canadian Men’s Curling Championship.

A berth in the Montana’s Brier in Regina will be on the line at 2:30PM Sunday afternoon when Team Calvert plays the winner of the Sunday morning Viterra Championship semi-final between top seeded Team Carruthers and #4 seed Jordon McDonald.

It took an extra end Saturday evening but the #3 seeded Calvert team was an 8-7 last stone winner over Team Carruthers in the Page Playoff 1-2 game. Up 7-5 coming home, Braden Calvert faced three with his last stone draw. He saw that rock slide deep to give the Brad Jacobs-skipped team a steal of two to force the extra end. Their last shot on the extra was an open hit in the four foot facing two and it was a perfect nose hit for the win.

Calvert and Carruthers were the Saturday morning “A” Side qualifers with wins over Ryan Wiebe and Riley Smith respectively.

Jordon McDonald and Jeff Stewart were the “B” side qualifers for the Page Playoff championship round. On the Saturday 2PM draw, McDonald ousted Wiebe and Stewart beat Smith.

The McDonald-Stewart Page 3-4 Playoff game was a tight affair with McDonald making a last stone hit facing two for a 4-3 victory.

The McDonald-Carruthers game is scheduled for 9AM in Stonewall. The winner will pay Calvert at 2:30PM in the final.

Justin Richter, skip of a Beausejour entry in the 2024 Viterra Championship, has been voted by the curlers as the 2024 recipient of the Pat Spiring Award. It is the second consecutive, and third overall, selection of Richter for the award.

The award was established by the family and CurlManitoba back in 2014 in tribute to the memory of Pat Spiring.

The past recipients of the award are:

Pat was respected by his fellow competitors for is on-ice ability, his competitive spirit, his love of the game, and his respect for the traditions and spirit of the sport of curling. Each year, the curlers in the Viterra championship are asked to select a recitpient who embodies those same characteristics.

2024: Justin Richter
2023: Justin Richter
2022: not presented
2021: not presented
2020: William Lyburn
2019: Rob Van Kommer & Cory Barkley
2018:  Andrew Wickman
2017: Jason Gunnlaugson
2016: Justin Richter
2015: Kelly Robertson
2014: Kelly Robertson & Allan Lyburn

Down to eight teams, the 2024 Manitoba Men’s Championship began a new double-knockout playoff round Friday evening in Stonewall and the fans at Stonewall’s Veteran’s Memorial Sports Complex got more than their money’s worth.

The feature match-up was Team Carruthers against the young Jordan McDonald team. In the tenth end, needing a point to tie, McDonald played a runback on a centre guard which killed the two Carruthers counters and moved two more Carruthers stones. They had the one and there was a measure for a pair to win. The measure went Team Carruthers way and the McDonald team built an end on the eleventh which was looking good until Jacobs threw a quadruple take-out hit to lie one. With his final stone, McDonald buried a draw and forced Team Carruthers skip Brad Jacobs to draw the four-foot circle for an 8-7 victory.

In other games Riley Smith also needed an extra end for an 9-8 win over Brett Walter; Ryan Wiebe defeated Greg Todoruk 8-6; and Braden Calvert was a 12-3 winner over Jeff Stewart.

The 9AM Saturday draw will identify the first two qualifiers for the Page Playoff Championship round. Team Carruthers will play Riley Smith and Braden Calvert will play Ryan Wiebe.

The 9AM elimination game matchups will be Greg Todoruk vs Jeff Stewart and Jordon McDonald vs Brett Walter.

The third & fourth championship qualifiers will come from the 2PM draw.

On the Friday 8:30AM draw, the “A” side qualifiers were Riley Smith-Charleswood, with a score of three coming home to beat Team Carruthers-Granite; Ryan Wiebe-Fort Rouge (7-5 over Justin Richter-Beausejour); Braden Calvert-Fort Rouge (5-2 win over Greg Todoruk-Dauphin); and Jordon McDonald-Assiniboine Memorial (6-2 over Brett Walter-AMCC) .

On the Friday 4PM draw, Carruthers (9-2 over Logan Ede-Stonewall), Todoruk (7-0 over Steve Irwin-Brandon), and Walter (9-2 over Cale Dunbar-Brandon) all bounced back to qualify for the playoff round through the “B” side of the draw. Richter was defeated 7-6 by Jeff Stewart-Gladstone.

Prior to the Friday evening draw, CurlManitoba announced the results of the players’ selection as the recipient of the annual Pat Spiring Memorial Award. Justin Richter was the curler chosen, for the second consecutive year, as the one who best exemplifies the late Pat Spiring’s ability, competitive spirit, love of the game, and respect for the traditions & spirit of the sport of curling.

With play underway in Stonewall to determine this year’s Viterra Manitoba Men’s Curling Champions, CurlManitoba has announced that the 2025 event will be co-hosted by the Portage Curling Club and Portage Regional Recreation Authority at Stride Place in Portage.

The 32-team gathering of curlers from across Manitoba will take on special significance in 2025 as it is the 100th anniversary of the very first Manitoba championship played in 1925, and won by the legendary Howard Wood Sr.

Coincidentally, because of the one-year cancellation of the championship in 2021 due to Covid, the 2025 event will also be the actual 100th Manitoba Men’s Curling Championship.

We are delighted to be able to bring the championships back to Portage,” say host committee co-chairs Rob Gemmell and Dean Moxham. “Stride Place is a great curling-venue arena and an ideal size to host the Viterra Championship.”

“CurlManitoba is pleased to be able to confirm the venue and announce it at this time. This allows us to begin the preparations for a true celebration of the history of curling and of this championship,” says CurlManitoba Executive Director Craig Baker.

Portage has hosted the Manitoba Men’s Championship on three different occasions. The 2017 Viterra Championship was won there by Mike McEwen; the 2003 Safeway Championship by John Bubbs; and the 1999 Safeway Select by Jeff Stoughton.

The Manitoba Men’s championship was played in Winnipeg until 1968. That year, it was played in Brandon’s Wheat City Arena.

In all Brandon has been the host city nine times. Selkirk has hosted six times; Portage will join Dauphin, Neepawa and Virden as four time hosts; Morden and Steinbach have hosted twice; and Beausejour, Flin Flon, Thompson, Stonewall and Winkler have hosted once each.

Canada’s men’s curling championship, the Brier, was first played in 1927. In the two years after Manitoba’s championship was established, the Manitoba champions (Wood in 1925 and George Sherwood in 1926) were sponsored by Macdonald Tobacco on good-will visits to Eastern Canada to compete in events against the best curlers in the east. The sponsor and organizers recognized the merits of a national event and the Brier was born.

The Viterra Championship version of the tagline “everyone wants to beat the champion” ALMOST came true doubly Friday afternoon at the 2024 Manitoba Men’s Curling Championship in Stonewall.

In this instance replace ‘champion’ with ‘top seed’ and it was #1 seed Team Carruthers, skipped by Olympic gold medalist Brad Jacobs, who almost got beat. It was 2023 Saskatchewan junior champion Logan Ede, skipping a young Stonewall team, who pushed the top seed to the limit. Tied 2-2 coming home, the Ede foursome was laying three when Jacobs made his last stone hit for the 3-2 win.

At the same time, second seed Ryan Wiebe was pushed past ten ends by Justin Reynolds and his team from Winnipeg Beach. Tied 6-6, Wiebe had last shot on the extra end and, like Jacobs, had a hit to win 7-6.

On the “A” Side of the preliminary double knock-out round, the top seeds joined six other winners to set up the 8:30AM Friday draw, when the first four Qualifiers will be identified for the next Playoff Round.

The teams which have won their first two games, and their Friday morning match-ups are:

#1 Team Carruthers (Granite) vs #7 Riley Smith (Charleswood)
#2 Ryan Wiebe (Fort Rouge) vs Justin Richter (Beausejour)
#3 Braden Calvert (Fort Rouge) vs Greg Todoruk (Dauphin)
#4 Jordon McDonald (Assiniboine Memorial) vs #5 Brett Walter (Assiniboine Memorial)

Meanwhile, the original 32-team has has been cut to sixteen. On the “B” Side of the draw, #6 Steve Irwin (Brandon) has won a pair of games after a first round loss but #8 seed Sean Grassie (Deer Lodge) has been eliminated. The “B” Side survivors are Irwin, Cale Dunbar (Brandon), Logan Ede (Stonewall), Hayden Forrester (Fort Rouge), Jace Freeman (Virden), Justin Reynolds (Winnipeg Beach), Jeff Stewart (Gladstone), and Devon Wiebe (Charleswood).

With two notable exceptions, the opening day of the 2024 Viterra Manitoba Men’s Curling Championships went as might have been predicted.

On the first day of play in the 32-team double knockout preliminary round, the top eight seeds are drawn against seeds 25 to 32 while the middle sixteen teams play an opponent closer to their own status according to the draw seeding which is done exclusively by the other teams. The results of those first eight games are considered predictable while the other eight games are usually considered toss-ups.

Consequently, a first game loss by a top-eight seeded team is considered to be an upset and 2024’s first day saw two of them.

Jesse Janz, playing in his second Viterra championship got his first win with an 8-6 win over #8 seed Sean Grassie (Deer Lodge). The Baldur team scored three on the seventh end and broke open a 3-3 tie.

The #6 seed, Steve Irwin (Brandon), also lost his opening game. The Brandon team trailed 8-1 after 6 ends but scored three consecutive deuces against Greg Todoruk (Dauphin) to trail 8-7 coming home. The Brandon team as laying three when Todoruk threw a last stone draw through a port to touch the shot stone on the four foot circle and score one for a 9-7 win.

Dropping to the B-Side of the draw, Grassie faced Dean North (Carman) in a late draw elimination game. Grassie, who had stolen singles twice in the game, was tied 5-5 coming home without last rock and was able to post a third steal for a 6-5 win.

Also in an elimination game, Irwin trailed Greg Melnichuk (Granite) 3-1 at the mid-game break. Irwin led 5-4 playing the tenth and forced Melnichuk to draw for 1 facing two to tie. Irwin controlled the extra end. He had an open hit in the centre of the rings for a 7-5 win.

Results for the other top-8 seeded teams in their only games on opening day were:

# 1 Team Carruthers, Granite: 9-1 win over Brad Micholson, Deer Lodge
#2 Ryan Wiebe, Fort Rouge: 10-3 win over Grant Brown, Burntwood
#3 Braden Calvert, Fort Rouge: 10-5 win over Jeremy Sundell, Holland
#4 Jordon McDonald, Assiniboine Memorial: 9-2 win over Glen Toews, Dauphin
#5 Brett Walter, Assiniboine Memorial: 9-4 win over Travis Gregory, Hamiota
#7 Riley Smith, Charleswood: 8-5 win over Mark Lowdon, La Salle

With North and Melnichuk, the other late draw elimination game losers were Jeremy Sundell (Holland) and Grant Brown (Burntwood).

Newly crowned Saskatchewan champion Mike McEwen will be in Stonewall this week for Manitoba’s Viterra Championship.

The four-time Manitoba Men’s champion skip (+ 2 juniors & 1 mixed) will provide the expert analysis on CurlManitoba’s livestream ‘broadcasts’ of the weekend playoff round as well as one preliminary round game.

McEwen has been a competitor in the last eight Canadian Brier championships as Manitoba champion, as a wildcard entry, and last year as the Ontario champion. He is the first skip to win three provinces and has done it three years in a row Manitoba (2022), Ontario (2023), and now Saskatchewan (2024).

As skip of the current #6 ranked team on the CTRS, and as a longtime Manitoba competitor, McEwen’s insights into the skills and strategies of the competing teams will enhance the commentary.

McEwen will join the CurlManitoba crew of commentators which includes Rick Brownlee, Pat Carson, Matt Dunlop, Resby Coutts, Keith Johnston, Norm Magnusson, and Craig Nichol. Viterra representative Ray Baloun will also make an appearance in the broadcast booth during the first game Wednesday morning.

The CurlManitoba livestream game will feature a game from every draw – all 17 games from sheet C at Stonewall’s Veteran’s Memorial Arena, thanks to the technical efforts of Big Day Media and the livestream sponsorship of Sunrise Credit Union, Seagram’s 83 and Pharmasave.

A link to CurlManitoba’s YouTube Channel can be found at curlmanitoba.org