MEDFORD CURLING - Boys finish up strong, girls wear down at Tietge

MEDFORD CURLING

After a rough start Friday afternoon, things clicked into place for the Medford boys curling team over the weekend as the Raiders advanced to the second event finals at the Tietge Bonspiel in Wausau.

The girls battled illness and long days of play as they advanced to the third event semifinals before getting eliminated.

The event featured high school curlers from 44 different teams for the two-day tournament held at the Wausau Curling Center Friday and Saturday.

Action started at 8 a.m. Friday with the Medford girls, led by skip Caidyn Zenner, defeating Pardeeville 8-4. The girls then advanced to a 1 p.m. game against the Portage II girls team where they got a solid 8-2 win in a rematch of their Battle of the Brooms victory at the start of the season.

The win advanced them to a matchup with D.C. Everest I in the quarterfinal round in the first event that started at 7 p.m. Friday.

For Medford this was the team’s third game in less than 12 hours. Medford has a three-person team with Zenner, third Erica Brandner and lead Stacey Dassow. In typical fashion, the girls played physical games relying on strong sweeping throughout. Frequently, Zenner would need to come out to help Dassow with sweeping.

By comparison, the D.C. Everest benefited from having the shorter bracket and came into the quarterfinal game fresher only having played a single game that afternoon, beating Wausau West 2.

With more than six hours of curling action in a single day, the Raiders put up a strong showing, but ran out of steam in an 8-6 loss. If Medford was healthier and wellrested the result might have been far different.

The loss bumped the girls from the first event into the semifinal game of the third event where they faced Wausau West I Saturday afternoon in another rematch from earlier in the season. Exhaustion and illness again were a factor in a 9-3 loss.

On the boys side, skip Rylan Stockwell led the Medford boys in a tight first-round game Friday afternoon against Wausau West III, they came out on the short end of an 8-6 loss.

This bumped the boys into the second event bracket playing the 9:30 p.m. draw on Friday against D.C. Everest II. The games went past midnight with the boys coming out 9-3 winners.

The boys moved on to the quarterfinal game Saturday afternoon the Lodi II and took a dominating 8-0 win to advance to the second event finals on Saturday evening against Bloomer.

Throughout the weekend, the boys had struggled with reading the ice and getting the weight of their rocks under control, at times alternating between coming up short of the house on draws or narrowly missing clutch take-outs as the rocks sailed through the house without curling enough for the pick. These are indicative of the team’s youth.

In the finals game, Medford faced Bloomer and took a 10-0 loss. While the Medford boys had opportunities, the Bloomer boys played impressively and seemingly could not miss a shot. This is not surprising since two of the boys have qualified for U18s and another for U21 playdowns. The boys came home with second place in the second event.

Beyond the curling action, the annual Tietge Bonspiel gives the players the experience of curling in a large-scale event with exposure to different styles of play as well as the endurance factor with multiple games in a single day.

It gives a preview to the state tournament that will be held in Wausau Feb. 14-15 where Medford will see many of these same teams.