Friday, January 25, 2008

Witt, boo-birds and a shocking dismissal


















If you call yourself a curling fan, you simply must tune in to the Masters of Curling semi-final tomorrow afternoon (3:00pm ET on CBC Sports). Tributes to the late Don Wittman (wearing the infamous peach jacket in another classic screenshot above) will abound, not only on the competitor uniforms but also in a special video tribute.

The final, of course, goes Sunday at 3:00pm ET.

There will be competition, of course. According to the handy JVC TV Curling Guide in the January print edition of The Curling News, there are women’s provincial finals on television in New Brunswick and B.C. this weekend. You’ve got that issue handy, right?

Elsewhere:


Jennifer Jones got booed last night, big time, and from a Manitoba crowd ...

• Just two days after winning Female Team of the Year honours at the Ottawa Sports Awards – on a night which saw Glenn Howard lead Craig Savill win the Male Athlete of the Year award – Team Rachel Homan has parted ways with lead Nikki Johnston. More details will appear in Joe Pavia’s column in Saturday’s Ottawa Sun ...

Warren Hansen says curling needs a Tiger ...

• There’s lots of Masters curling going on, and not just in Saskatoon. There’s new Masters champs in PEI today (men and women), and in Nova Scotia and Northern Ontario, too ...

• And hey, don’t forget the Grand Masters in Ontario... for the 70-and-over crowd! More on this group coming soon ...

Mike Harris talks streaks, Gretzky and more on another webisode of the Capital One Curlers Corner ...

Darah The Explorer has found another team, and it quite busy with a great COC outreach program ...

One Female Canuck just loved her curling debut (we knew she would, right?) ...

Someone thinks Team Pete Fenson are a bunch of hotties ...

• Here be a look back at the origins of curling in Woodstock, Ontario, the host of next year’s 2009 provincial men’s championship ...

Cristina Brazil has a decent slide, but needs work on her release ...

• Cape Cod has a new handicap-access curling facility ...

• Guess what? Another Saskatchewan playdown format change is in the works ...

• And finally, TSN has gone and built a dedicated webpage charting the progress of the CTRS (the what?) qualifiers toward the Pre-Trials Qualifier (the what?) to find the eventual final eight teams for the Canadian Olympic Curling Trials.

Thanks, guys – we get confused about it pretty easily. So does Brad Gushue, apparently, and he’s got even more to say than that ...

No comments: