An Estevan curling team went head to head against some national and world champions at the Master Men's provincial curling championship.
Derrell Sears skipped his team to a 2-3 record from March 9 to 13 in Gravelbourg but failed to make it to the playoffs. It was his third trip to the championship in the last four years.
This time he actually lost in the regional qualifier in Weyburn, but when the team that beat them couldn't go, Sears and his rink packed their bags.
"They couldn't make it, so we ended up going," Sears said. "The atmosphere is always great. I'm a little more comfortable with it."
His team ended up in very tough pool, however.
"We had a world champion in our pool, Eugene Hritzuk, and we also had a Canadian champion in our pool, Gary Bryden. We were in a tough pool."
Sears loves the competition, though.
"It's awesome, because you bring the level of your game up when you play against them. I've always been of the theory that the better the team you play, the better you curl yourself."
The Estevan squad certainly held its own against the established competition, never losing a match by more than a point.
"The game with Hritzuk, we had to go two extra ends. It's an eight end game, we had to actually go 10 ends. Two extra ends because the ninth end was blank, because there wasn't really any place to get into the rings. Hritzuk made a heck of a shot in the 10th end. He made an angle raise to the four-foot to win the game."
Sears lost the match to Hritzuk 9-8 but went on to beat Bryden 8-5.
Playing in their last round-robin game, he said it was mostly a fun game for the team.
"We knew we were out of the playoffs, because there were two teams at 4-1. We kind of had a lot of fun in that (final) game. We didn't go out to lose or anything, but we had a lot of fun, and we were relaxed. Again the (loss) was by one point."
In the four-man team two players were new.
"I was very proud of the way they curled. Me and the third, we were there together last year, and we had a new front end. So we were getting used to them, but they curled well."
