Maine wheelchair curlers seek title

UTICA, N.Y. – A tenacious New York curling club fought back from a 6-5 deficit to beat Maine 8-6 in the middle game of the U.S. Curling Association’s National Wheelchair Curling Championships at the Utica Curling Club Friday.

Maine, the defending U.S. wheelchair champions, won the opening game in the best-of-three series 7-5 Friday morning. The two teams square off for the title Saturday morning.

The winner will represent the USA in the 2005 Wheelchair World Curling Championship Jan. 17-22 in Glasgow, Scotland. The Maine team finished fifth in last year’s worlds. It is shooting for its third trip to the tournament in as many years.

Only two teams are competing in the U.S. Nationals. The New York team, from the host Utica Curling Club, lost to the same Maine team in a tiebreaker in last year’s nationals.

In the opener, Maine jumped to a 3-0 lead in the first end and was ahead 5-0 after two, but New York kept chipping away. After five ends, Maine clung to a 6-5 lead. In the last and sixth end, Maine skip Wes Smith nudged New York’s innermost stone and left his in scoring position. New York skip Mark Taylor, who had last rock, failed to take out Smith’s, giving Maine a narrow 7-5 victory.

Maine coach Jeff Dutch felt his team stuck to its game plan in the first game.

“Getting the early lead proved to be very beneficial,” he said. “We had planned to be offensive-minded even though we didn’t have the last rock, and we established a confident feeling that comes from being ahead.”

In addition to the 64-year-old skip Smith, the other Maine curlers in the first game were Sam Woodward of Surrey, Loren Kinney of Hallowell, and Mary Dutch of Belfast. Danell Libby of Gray played in the second game in place of Kinney.

Maine’s experience almost made the difference throughout the second game. New York took a 2-0 lead in the first end. Maine went up 3-2 in the second, and it battled neck-and-neck the rest of the way. New York made it 5-3 in the fourth, but Smith rallied Maine to a three-point fifth end.

With Maine up 6-5, Libby inadvertently had a missed hit in the sixth end of the second game that led to New York’s dramatic comeback. She took out a Maine rock while pushing New York’s closer to the button. New York made the most of the “hammer,” or last shot of the game, and grabbed three points in the sixth end.

“You can see these teams are very equal,” Smith said. “To get a big jump on them in the first game took some luck and they missed a few shots. You still have to adjust your strategy end by end and shot by shot.”