THUNDER BAY – The battle of the McCarvilles came down to one final shot per side on Wednesday night.
Playing a shot to the button in lieu of an extra end, Mike McCarville came up a little short, leaving his wife Krista a shot to the four-foot for the win.
The eight-time provincial women's champion was a tad heavy, but her rock halted just in time in the back four-foot, earning her a come-from behind 5-4 victory to improve to 4-1 in Tbaytel Major League of Curling play at the Port Arthur Curling Club.
“This is probably our biggest game of the year when we play each other,” Krista McCarville said. “We want to beat each other out there so badly. Nobody wants to lose out there. We're always joking around at home and having fun with that.
“Being out there, it's pretty intense, but at the same time we're having fun.”
It's not hard to get up for a game against his wife's team, said Mike McCarville, whose team has come close in all of it's matches, but only has one win in five outings to show for it.
“It's just fun,” he said. “It's fun that we can go out and play against each other and it's going to be competitive. It's going to be really good, it's going to be close. It's nice that both teams curled good tonight. It was a good game and it came right down to the wire.”
The Mike McCarville rink was in command in the early going, jumping out to a 3-1 lead at the fourth-end break.
But Krista McCarville (4-1), whose team includes Sarah Potts, Ashley Sippala and Jordan Potts, threaded the needle with her final stone in the sixth, chipping away her opponent's shot stone to score a pair and even up the match.
She stole a single in seven, but left Mike McCarville with a chance at a draw to the four to score two in the eighth to win.
He said they weren't too concerned about the stolen point, figuring they could find a way to pick up deuce with hammer in the final end.
It just didn't work out.quite as planned.
“I had a draw to bite the edge of the button on my last one. I just had to bite a piece of the button and missed it. Her draw was that much better in the draw to the button for the win.”
On the other side of the club, former Canadian mixed curling champion Trevor Bonot was playing giant killer for the second draw in a row.
A week after toppling Frank Morissette from the ranks of the unbeaten he was at it again.
Bonot made a pinpoint shot in the sixth to score three to extend his lead to four and ran Dylan Johnston out of rocks in the eighth to earn a 6-3 win and improve to 3-2.
Both teams embarked on an aggressive strategy.
“When that happens you're going to have some slow ends and a lot of rocks in play. The fifth end was very slow and we gave up a deuce and that was fine. We did it again, we were in control up one and in the sixth end we got an opportunity. Dylan came up a little light and allowed me to make that double raise. There was a little bit of risk, but the reward was great if we made it properly,” Bonot said.
Johnston dropped to 4-1 with the loss.
In other action, Morissette made a draw to the button in lieu of an extra end to score a 6-5 win over Ben Mikkelson, who fell to 2-3, dropping his third straight. Al Hackner (4-1) made easy work of Jonathon Vellinga (3-2), downing him 10-1 in six ends to claim a share of top spot with Johnston and Krista McCarville, while Bryan Burgess (3-2) stole deuces in the third and fourth ends and hung on to edge Britney Malette 7-5. Gary Weiss (3-2) just got past Dylan Burgess (0-5), winning 5-4.
