Registered: Apr 2007
Location:
Posts: 83

I know BC curling has gotten a bit slower over the years, but not even anything to chat about in the last 3 months?

Let's see Tardi won juniors and are also on their way to Men's provincials.

Mr. Matthew MrGrady put on a great entertaiing show on tv not only in his curling ability but also his excitement for the game, was great to watch someone that in love with the sport!

The unfortunate news is seeing the low numbers of entries in all of the men's zones. I believe we we under 35 teams enter total province-wide (don't quote me on that number), but pretty soon you'll enter and get a 50/50 chance of getting to provincials that is sad to see the sport is not thriving as in other regions of the country.

Not sure what the answer is to this and I'm not starting an argument string, just trying to get some conversation about the sport in BC and see if any ideas develop from here that can be constructive.

Predictions on BC Scotties or BC CDI Mens?

Last edited by hogginsheets on 01-08-16 at 04:05PM

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Registered: Dec 2012
Location: BC, Ontario (and a few other places too...)
Posts: 268

Matthew McCrady... get the spelling right! A very good showing from a team that is still eligible for Juveniles... they have a great future ahead of them.

Juniors was an entertaining event. Pretty solid curling, even though there were 3 teams that generally stood out from the rest on the boys side, and of course the 2 on the ladies. It's too bad that some teams will be undergoing some significant changes as players age out (I think of those 5 teams, it's only Team McCrady that will be entirely eligible for juniors next season), but there are some very good teams coming up to keep things interesting.

Juvenile entries are fairly solid this year, all things considered, which bodes well for the future. It is a BC Winter Games year though, and that always inflates the numbers a bit.

Men's and Women's playdowns... ick. Men's I think are down a bit because of the location of the championship (Nelson) and of the Open event (Salmon Arm). Neither location is an easy-to-get-to spot for teams from the coast and island.

And yes, I know the province isn't just the Lower Mainland and Vancouver Island, but lets face it, most curlers are located there (and in the Okanagan). I'm glad that they moved the event to an interior club this year, but I know the travel impacted some people's decisions on whether to compete or not.

But over all, BC men's and women's entries are suffering from the same malaise that every province is suffering from. We can discuss the reasons over and over again (and we've done that frequently already), but the professionalization of the sport (thank you Olympics) has changed playdowns and the Brier and Scotties, for better or for worse.

(There are other reasons too why curling numbers are down in general in Canada and that impacts competitive numbers as well... but that's a discussion for elsewhere.)

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Registered: Sep 2002
Location: vernon bc
Posts: 2340

The simple answer is the blame lies with Curl BC for the downturn in competitive participation. It began with high performance camps focusing on only a select few individuals rather than improving coaching where it's really needed;at the club level for new curlers. The initial Curl Canada program produced thousands of new curlers with good basics from which to develop. Now there seems to be almost no accredited coaches instructing first timers. I see people with incredibly poor basics in delivery, sweeping and strategy. Inevitably most get frustrated and quit the game and who can blame them? It's like joining a golf course, buying the clubs and then having no pro to teach you. Sure, it's fun for a bit. But shooting 120 gets old very quickly.

The decline has nothing to do with 'professionalism'. It's totally the result of focusing on a few instead of the majority who need the help.

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Registered: Dec 2012
Location: BC, Ontario (and a few other places too...)
Posts: 268

It's not just a Curl BC problem though, but a curling in Canada problem. Every province has seen playdown entries drop, not just BC.

You do have a point in that the basic aren't being taught to novice curlers properly. But those adult novice curlers are not the ones going to enter playdowns more often than not. Even if they manage to get better instruction.

They may fill up your club (which is what we need to have happen as well), and with better instruction they may stick around long term, but I just don't think you're going to see them flock to playdowns.

(And in BC, there is a disconnect between competitive curlers who came up through the juniors, and those who started later. Those who started later, even if they are sound curlers, seem to be treated as a bit of a second class to those who have junior experience. That doesn't seem to be quite the same problem in Ontario that I noticed, but... you definitely see that around BC. And that turns some people off and away from participating as well.)

But long-term improvement of playdown entries probably requires more teams into competitive junior programs as well. And that where I really agree with you in that clubs need to have good quality coaching to develop and encourage that talent.

And we will continue to disagree about the professionalism part of the equation as well... I think we've had that debate before!

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Sometimes I think the surest sign that intelligent life exists elsewhere in the universe is that none of it has tried to contact us.
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