Howard and his rink of third Daniel Selke, second Mat Ring and lead Scott Deck improved to 4-0 in round robin action on Saturday after taking 6-2 win over Canora’s Rob Zuravloff (1-3) on Saturday afternoon, guaranteeing themselves a top-three finish in Pool A.
That’s the same situation Kelly Knapp and his Regina Highland rink of Moose Jaw third Brock Montgomery, second Mike Armstrong and lead Trent Knapp find themselves in after taking a 7-3 win over Highland’s Ben Gamble (1-3) in Pool B action.
Gedak and his crew of former Moose Jaw junior standouts including third Jason Ackerman, second Derek Owens and lead Curtis Horwath sit at 3-1 in Pool A, having taken a 9-3 victory over Regina’s Shane Vollman. Their only loss came at the hands of Howard, a 7-1 defeat in the Saturday morning draw.
Over in Pool B, one of the pre-tournament favourites in Saskatoon’s Rylan Kleiter, second Josh Mattern, third Trevor Johnson and lead Matthieu Taillon sit in second at 3-1, having won their afternoon contest 7-5 over Fox Valley’s Ryan Deis. Like Gedak, they lost their morning game, 7-6 to Knapp.
Moose Jaw’s Brett Behm, third Brendan Ross, second Daniel Mutlow and lead Ian Howell sit in a three-way tie at 1-3 in Pool A and close out their round robin against Gedak during the 7 p.m. draw at Moose Jaw Ford Curling Centre.
Other evening contests in the A Pool feature Howard against Regina’s Samuel Wills (2-2) and Vollman (1-3) battling Zuravloff (1-3).
B Pool contests will see Kleiter facing Regina’s Joshua Bryden (2-2), Knapp against Regina’s Dustin Woloschuk (1-3) and Gamble facing Deis (1-3).
The second and third place teams from each pool will play in the quarter-final at 9:30 a.m. on Sunday, with the winners there facing the top-seeds at 1 p.m. A 4:30 p.m. final has yet to be confirmed by CurlSask.
