Stratton man advances to provincial curling playdowns

By Lucas Punkari
Fort Frances Times

In what proved to be a wild affair, Trevor Bonot’s Stratton rink captured the NOCA Region 1 men’s title here last night following a 9-7 extra-end win over Adam Bolen of Fort Frances, earning a berth to next month’s provincial playdowns in Sault Ste. Marie.
“This feels pretty good, especially to be able to go back to the provincials for the second time,” said Bonot, who played second on Brian Adams Jr.’s rink during the 2009 provincial championship that was held here.
“It was a crazy weekend with a lot of rocks in play, and all three teams here were pretty even when you look at the final standings, so what more could you ask for,” Bonot added.
Bonot, who originally is from Stratton but now lives in Thunder Bay, finished in a three-way tie with Bolen and John Cummine (Sioux Lookout) following the double round-robin with a 2-2 mark.
But he earned a bye straight into the final by virtue of having the best average draw shot ranking during the pre-game draw to the button.
That left Bolen and Cummine to battle it out yesterday afternoon for a spot in the final, which Bolen took by a score of 10-8.
“A big part of that win came from the momentum we picked up beating them [8-5] earlier that morning,” Bolen noted.
“That gave us a lot of confidence going into the tie-breaker.
“And other than one bad end we had in the sixth end, where we gave up three points, we played great,” added Bolen, who was joined by third Mitch Seguin, second Matt Johnson, and lead Travis Showalter.
In the final last night, Bolen led 5-2 at the fifth-end break but Bonot roared back with steals of one in both the seventh and eighth ends to knot the score.
Bolen then picked up his deuce with the hammer in the ninth to take a 7-5 lead into the 10th.
With Bolen sitting shot in the four-foot, Bonot made a great take-out on his final stone to earn his deuce and set the stage for a dramatic extra-end finish.
On the final shot of the game, Bolen had to draw into the full four-foot to snag the provincial berth.
But while the weight seemed to be spot-on, his rock nicked off one of his stones in the eight-foot, allowing Bonot to steal a pair and capture the title.
“We had to come through that tight hole there and we were just waiting for it to curl,” Bolen said afterwards.
“Once it did curl, we think the rock might of fudged a little bit there, but we don’t have any excuses.
“It was that close and we got really excited, but it ended up coming an inch short,” he sighed.
Bonot’s rink, which includes third Scott McCallum, second Tim Jewett, lead Andrew McCormick, and fifth Al Macsemchuk, now will be head to the provincial playdowns Feb. 5-12 in Sault Ste. Marie.
The winner of that event will represent Northern Ontario at the Tim Hortons Brier, which will take place March 3-11 in Saskatoon.