Ted CLARKE Citizen staff
Growing up in a clan of curlers, Heather Bethune somehow resisted the urge to pick up a broom and toss stones on the ice.
She’d never played until this year.
The 29-year-old Bethune finally caved in to the family obsession and took on the lead position on a crackerjack crew with her sister Sarah Nelson, third Kelsi Pakula and skip Jen Rusnell, which had its share of success back in their teenaged years as one of the province’s top junior teams.
All that experience, combined with Bethune’s newfound talent for curling, added up to an undefeated run to the Prince George women’s bonspiel title Sunday afternoon at the Prince George Golf and Curling Club. They defeated 19-year-old skip Alyssa Connell 6-2 in a seven-end final for the trophy.
“She’s always been here, our family curls, but she’s never been interested, and she’s good,” said Nelson, referring to her younger sister. “She had a really good weekend and she enjoyed it, she had a ton of fun.”
The four women curl with the men on Thursday nights in the commercial league, which helped them tune up for the weekend.
“Heather was a natural, she picked it up really quickly and said that was because she was stuck watching us a juniors following us around to events,” said Rusnell, part of the Patti Knezevic women’s team which represented B.C at the 2015 Scotties Tournament of Hearts. “But she was a natural and played really well this weekend and it’s fun to play with her.”
Rusnell started with a win over Stefanie Caplette, then defeated Cindy Noseworthy and Knezevic to get to the A-final. Connell got past Lynda Pattie in the opening round, then beat Wendee Copeland, Cleo Shepert and Tracey Jones.
“In the final we played well and we kind of had our rocks in good spots and caught on to the ice early and it was a good game,” said Rusnell.
Leading 2-1 in the fourth end, Connell gambled with her second shot and lost, clearing just one red rock out of the house when she needed to evict two. Rusnell was able to get around a guard to draw for a three-ender and a 5-1 lead which effectively sealed the deal.
Rusnell added one more in the fifth, countered by Connell in the sixth, not enough to prolong the game.
“That sheet was really curling one way and we hadn’t thrown the other way yet so we weren’t sure where to put the broom and were nervous about icing it to promote her stone and it looked a little scary halfway down, said Rusnell. “I wasn’t quite sure we were going to get past their rock.”
The three veterans of Rusnell’s squad were runners-up to Falon Burkitt in 2017 and last won the women’s bonspiel 10 years ago, when they were still competing for junior titles.
Connell teamed up with third Jodi Gervais, second Cathy McLean and lead Joanne Goodall for the women’s bonspiel.
“None of us have ever played together before and we just came out for a fun weekend and we’re very happy with how we did,” said Connell.
“We kind of put all our eggs in one basket (in the fourth end) and it didn’t quite work out for us. We kept having opportunities to score multiple points and didn’t quite get all the way there. The ice was tricky so pretty much any draw was a tough one.”
Connell, still a junior skip, also played in the men’s league with veteran Bud Burbee. She joined them in the commercial league the second week of the season, which proved beneficial for all involved.
“Playing with Bud Burbee helped me quite a bit,” sad Connell. “They always had a new look on the game I’d never seen before and it was just a really fun year with them.”
In the B-final of the bonspiel, Vonda Robinson defeated Copeland 7-4 and Pattie topped Melanie Ubleis of Fort St. James 8-7 in the C-final.
