BC’s Jenkins tops Ontario at Seniors

British Columbia’s Sandra Jenkins has rebounded nicely in her efforts to earn a place in the championship pool round at the 2015 Everest Canadian Senior Women’s Curling Championship at the Thistle CC. Jenkins, a bronze medalist with Shannon Kleibrink at the 2006 Winter Olympics, had dropped her first two games in this 2015 Seniors needing to win her last three games to secure a berth in the championship round.  The Salmon Arm skip followed up last night’s win over NL with a solid performance today against Ontario’s Kathy Brown. Jenkins scored two with the hammer in the first end, then stole a single point in the second end. Another score of two in the fourth end and another steal of one in the fifthe end put the game at 6-1 for BC. The teams traded deuces in the next two frames with the game conceded after seven ends 8-3.  BC is 2-2 while Ontario is 1-2. In other Pool B play this afternoon, the host province’s Terri Loblaw improved to 3-0 and the only undefeated team in this pool with a 6-3 win over PEI’s Shirley Berry. In Pool A play, Saskatchewan’s Cathy Inglis remains undefeated at 5-0 with a 12-4 win over Nunavut’s Bev Ford.  Nunavut is winless.  Québec’s Élaine Roy stayed in contention for a championship pool spot beating New Brunswick’ Shelly Graham 8-3.  Québec moves to 2-2 while Graham drops to 1-3. Finally, in a game that went the distance between two teams needing their second victories, Northern Ontario’s Peggy Taylor missed a come around tap back with her final stone allowing NWT’s Debbie Moss to steal a 7-5 victory keeping the Yellowknife squad in the mix for the next round. Pool play continues until Tuesday, March 24th. Fourteen men’s teams and 13 women’s teams (Yukon did not enter a team) are competing at this Canadian Seniors. Unlike the previous three years, when a pre-qualifying event was held to determine which two teams of gender advanced to the main draw, this year’s renewal sees all the teams seeded into two pools per gender to first play a round robin within their pool while also playing 8 end games as opposed to the 10 ends of the past. In men’s, the top four in each pool advance to the Championship Round for games against the teams from the opposite pool, while the bottom three in each go to the Seeding Pool. In women’s, the top four in each pool advance to the Championship Round for games against the teams from the opposite pool, while the bottom three in Pool A join the bottom two in Pool B for a round robin within the Seeding Pool. At the conclusion of the Championship Round on Friday, the semifinals will be held Saturday morning, March 28 at 9:30 a.m. MT, pairing 1 vs. 4 and 2 vs. 3. The winners then advance to their respective gold-medal finals at 2:30 p.m. while the losers meet in bronze-medal games at the same time. The winners of the 2015 Canadian Seniors will represent Canada at the 2016 World Senior Curling Championships, at a site and date to be announced by the World Curling Federation. Last year’s Canadian champions, skipped by Alan O’Leary of Nova Scotia and Lois Fowler of Manitoba, will be competing in this year’s World Seniors, April 18-25 at Sochi, Russia. Since the World Seniors began in 2002, Canada has won nine men’s and nine women’s titles. Draw results for the 2015 Canadian Seniors will be instantly available at www.curling.ca. For event information, visit the scoreboard here. This is the first year of a three-year agreement by Everest, the first nationwide funeral planning and concierge service, to be the title sponsor of the Canadian Seniors.