The Canadian governing body of two-person stick curling believes the sport has rock star appeal on the world stage.
“I would like to see it go as far as any curling has ever went because it’s a great sport,” said Ernie Oliver, a founding member and the first Canadian Stick Curling Association president.
The creation of a national competition with the champion of every province represented would hasten the establishment of a world event as an Olympic sport.
“It’s a very strong possibility,” said Harold Cook, president of the CSCA. “There is going to be all kinds of things as the sport continues to grow like world curling in two-person stick and I might not qualify to do it at that time but I’m still looking forward to it. I think it will be great.”
Two-person stick curling, consisting of one-hour six-end games with six rocks per team per end with no sweeping between the hog lines, is on display this week at the 14th annual Canadian Open Stick Curling Championship at the St. Albert Curling Club.
Forty-eight men’s, women’s and mixed teams from six provinces, including the 2018 champions from Alberta, British Columbia, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Nova Scotia, are delivering their best shot to win the Sure-Shot Stick Trophy.
“You’re going to see a lot of old people playing beyond what you would’ve thought were going to be their capabilities and honest to God they’re playing at a very good level. This curling is very, very good and most people don't appreciate it because they don't watch it,” said Cook, who also serves as the Manitoba Stick Curling Association president.
“Without all the sweeping and throwing with a stick it's a lot more tactically to it rather than you throw a rock and then the sweepers take it,” added Oliver, who switched to stick curling after “the old Manitoba tuck” gave out on his slide out of the hack.
The majority of the curlers at open nationals are over the age of 60 and several are in their 80s.
“A lot of people when they get to be a certain age they no longer want to come out for a two-hour event because it’s just two much for them and there is too much sweeping but with two-person stick it’s a one-hour game and you only sweep from the hog line in and if you don't it’s not a big deal but that's the only place you’re allowed to sweep and most people can handle that so it gives all the seniors and the disabled people the opportunity to play the sport,” said Cook, 78.
“You can also play as children and play just as good as an experienced curler. We were just in a bonspiel in a little town called Marquette (Oliver’s hometown) in Manitoba and they had 60-some-odd teams participate on two sheets of ice and it went right around the clock and it was the most fun you could ever imagine,” Cook said. “In one particular draw there was a guy 90 years old and his partner was 80 years old and they were playing against a boy that was 12 and his father, I’m going to assume he was 45, and I think they won the game but that's what stick curling has done. That's the beauty of this thing.
“As well that Marquette rink was closed and now it’s open and is probably one of the most profitable rinks in Manitoba because of stick curling.”
Oliver, 82, described the sport as therapeutic.
“It gets your mind off your problems, your illnesses. You go home when you’re done curling and you've got something to talk about with your wife because your friends are all there,” Oliver said. “It keeps people going.”
The origins of two-person stick curling and the CSCA formation can be traced to Oliver’s quest for ice time to showcase the sport.
“It was so hard to get any curling club to believe in you and to give you ice to play on. I was a fire chief at one time and I took a lot of training with the firemen in the city of Winnipeg and they invited me to come and use the ice at the Fort Rouge Curling Club that they didn't use so we could curl on that one (sheet) so that's where we come together and started curling,” said Oliver, who has a stick curling bonspiel named after him at the Assiniboine Memorial Curling Club in Winnipeg. “Then we found out if we change the game from eight rocks to six rocks and play six ends we could do two games while they played one so that was a change in the rules.
“The next couple of years later Fort Garry offered us ice and we had a league going there and then we went from Fort Garry to West Kildonan and then it mushroomed in Winnipeg.”
The first open nationals was 2005 at the Garrison Curling Club in Calgary.
“There is a group of people here that were all supporters of it when we started it and it’s nice to come here and share that with them,” said Oliver, a four-time Manitoba stick curling champion who is partnered with Leroy Clarke while competing in his 13th open nationals. “It was amazing the way they believed in it and look at it today; it’s just overwhelming to see the number of people and how it has grown.”
Last year’s open nationals was held at the Bluenose Curling Club in Glasgow, N.S. and this is the fifth year for the bonspiel in Alberta and the second time since 2014 St. Albert has hosted.
The breakdown of teams is 24 from Alberta, including eight St. Albert and four Morinville teams, six from British Columbia, two from Saskatchewan, nine from Manitoba, six from Nova Scotia and one from Prince Edward Island.
St. Albert is booming with more than 100 stick curlers and a popular Friday two-person stick league.
“There are a lot of hotbeds for two-person stick and there are hotbeds we don't know about and we’ve got to find those places like in Ontario and we don't know what’s going on in Quebec. We’ve got to find all that out and then expand it and we can expand it considerably,” said Cook, who is curling in his “11th or 12th, I’m not sure” open nationals and his partner is Faye Hodge. “She gives me hell out there. It’s interesting.”
Cook, a grandfather of 12 and a great-grandfather of one, stressed the CSCA must never lose touch with the grassroots of curling.
“Never mind all the fancy stuff, it’s all about the grassroots of it because that's what we have all learned to enjoy. If we get too sophisticated or too classy we're going to spoil it for ourselves,” said Cook, who works in the same floor covering distribution business for 62 years.
Oliver agreed: “Every (CSCA) meeting we have they’re still looking for changes in it but you've got to be careful. If it’s not broken don't change it,” said the retired “jack of all trades” who has lost track of how many grandkids he has.
HOG LINES: Jim Russell and Milt Larsen of the Mayflower Curling Club in Halifax, N.S. are the defending Sure-Shot Stick Trophy champions and the Morinville duo of Ryan Meyers and Dennis Fitzgerald are the 2018 winners of the Alberta Stick Curling Championship Trophy sponsored by Milt and June McDougall of St. Albert.
Meyers and Fitzgerald were also the 2014 open national finalists in St. Albert and the winning team for the second time during a run of three championships in six years was John Campbell and Tim Smith of the Armstrong (B.C.) Curling Club. Campbell and Smith are back at nationals with new partners.
Also in the hunt are two members of the 2015 Alberta Wheelchair Curling Championship team, Mike McMullen and Don Kuchelyma of the St. Albert and Jasper Place curling clubs, as well as Tony Van Brabant and Scott Holland of Morinville as the 2017 Alberta champions.
The 27th and last draw in the four-day bonspiel is Thursday’s final at 2:30 p.m., followed by the closing ceremonies.
Visit www.albertastickcurling.ca for more information on nationals.
