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Moose Jaw’s Holland finishes 3-1 at Curl Sask trial event

Veteran skip sees little problem with current COVID-19 changes to sport as new season forges carefully on
Amber Holland
Moose Jaw’s Amber Holland and her Davidson Curling Club foursome finished 3-1 at the SWCT trial event over the weekend. (Michael Burns, CurlingCanada.ca)
Amber Holland has seen and experienced pretty much all there is in the sport of curling.

From provincial and national championships in the junior and women’s ranks, to facing the best in the world at both those levels, the Moose Jaw product has done it all, even taking on the role of executive director of Curl Sask in the early 2010s.

But nothing could have prepared Holland or her fellow competitors for what they faced this past weekend at the Sask Women’s Curling Tour Trial Event at the Saskatoon Sutherland.

Holland and her Davidson rink of third Kim Schneider, second Karlee Korchnski and lead Deb Lozinski put together a 3-1 record at the 14-team event, which acted as a test subject for the new COVID-19 rules precautions put in place by Curling Canada and the provincial curling body.

“It was good, I think for the most part once you get into the game and get a feel for it, it’s just curling,” Holland said. “Yeah, there are different rules that we had to follow with one sweeper, skips not sweeping anything anywhere, that was a bit of an adjustment and it’ll be interesting to see how we move forward.

“But overall, the teams get it,” she added. “They understand there’s going to be some things that are different. Everybody was really good at doing what we needed to do off the ice in order to play on the ice… I think everyone is just excited to do something normal. It’s not completely normal but it’s as normal as it can be.”

The major concern for most teams is the one-sweeper rule, which in theory would mean throwers had to be more precise with their shots given less the lessened ability to control distance and curl.

But the way the game has evolved as of late has seen many top-flight teams using one sweeper on regular occasions, or alternating between the two. The real change came in how the line of each shot was called.

“I think in our sport the last few years we’ve dabbled in one sweeper and two sweeper, should we have two, should we have one,” Holland said. “So I didn’t see that much of a difference. Most teams did have the other sweeper engaged, where that sweeper would follow along or beside the rock and help the other sweeper with communication.

“So that’s the thing that most teams probably saw a difference in. If you try and do it with one sweeper by themselves, and I know our team practiced that, we lost out a bit on gathering the information to execute a shot.”

That plan seemed to work well for Holland and crew, as they fell 8-3 to Regina’s Ashley Howard but reeled off three straight wins after, downing Prince Albert’s Sherry Just 6-2, Regina’s Stasia Wisniewski 9-1 and Moose Jaw Ford Curling Club’s Lorraine Schneider 7-4.

“I think it’s a bit of having a new team,” Holland said of how things went through the weekend. “We did get a couple of practices together but we seemed to gel pretty fast and it felt really natural for us. We learned a lot as a team, and regardless of the wins and losses, we figured out how to make a few shots when we needed too and that’s how you get a few wins vs. a few losses.”

The question now is what they’ll have to play for going forward -- the Scotties Tournament of Hearts is still a go for now, but things could change quickly if the current outbreak in Ontario and Quebec isn’t contained swiftly.

“We’re all holding out hope, everybody is putting their curling dreams on a bit of a hope and a prayer this year,” Holland said. “That’s okay, but our team when it was formed was for provincials and Scotties and that’s still there for us as far as we know. We’ll continue to play, and if that doesn’t happen we’ll be on the ice just enjoying the game.”

Moose Jaw’s Skylar Ackerman didn’t have as much luck after her opening game win, finishing with a 1-3 record, as did Schneider. Saskatoon Nutana’s Hanna Anderson, with Moose Jaw’s Madison Johnson at second, finished 2-2, Regina’s Sherilee Orsted and third Candace Newkirk from Moose Jaw ended up 1-3.

The next event on the SWCT is Oct. 9-11 at the Regina Highland; Moose Jaw hosts their tour spiel Nov. 6-8.

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