Team Ontario women and Team British Columbia men claim victory at 2025 Canadian Curling Club Championships

Skip Lindsay Thorne of Team Ontario didn’t flinch when she lost her opening game of the 2025 Canadian Club Curling Championship in Winnipeg. 

Being one loss away from elimination in the double-knockout competition, her team ran the table towards success.

And when the last rock was thrown at the venerable old Granite Curling Club on Sunday, Thorne and Co. were women champions after rolling to a gold-medal win. 

Perhaps they discovered the formula for winning. Lose the opener and the rest is a piece of cake. 

The gold-medal win was the third in a row for her resilient team from Ottawa that refused to throw in the towel with its back against the wall. 

Thorne claimed Ontario’s fifth women’s title in the competition after posting a 7-6 win over Team Quebec’s Miriam Perron (Trois-Rivières). 

Thorne said she was nonplussed after losing her opener. 

“I know my team and we can play well. Being confident in our ability is something we have to remind ourselves of, even when we have bad games. It happens. Brush it off.  We know we can play well.” 

And they did. They seemed to have things well in hand in the final after scoring four in the sixth end to stretch their lead to 6-3, but Thorne flashed a hit in the seventh to open the door for the women from Quebec to score three and tie the game. 

But Thorne, supported by third/vice skip Melissa Gannon, second Emily Kelly, and lead Mychelle Zahab of the Rideau Curling Club, held firm.

Thorne rose to the top of Canadian club women’s curling despite playing a limited schedule. 

“We only play Tuesday nights,” she said. “We’re all ex-competitive players; we played in juniors. It’s a lot of time and money right now to play competitively, so we just enjoy our Tuesday night curling.” 

Team Ontario advanced to the final with a 4-3 win over Team Alberta’s Michelle Hartwell (Edmonton) in one semifinal earlier in the day. In the other semifinal, Perron defeated Team New Brunswick’s Sarah Gaines (Oromocto) 8-5. 

In the men’s gold-medal final, skip Mitch Young’s Team British Columbia from Cranbrook staged a late comeback to knock off veteran Mark Noseworthy and his Team Newfoundland & Labrador from the RE/MAX Centre in St. John’s 8-4. 

Young and his B.C. boys — third/vice skip Steve Tersmette, second Blair Jarvis, lead Kevin Hoglund, alternate Matthew Reynolds, and coach Chris Summers — looked in trouble against Noseworthy, trailing 4-2 after four ends, but scored four points over the next three ends to turn things around.

“We were in (trouble) for a bit but we won a couple of games (in the round robin) where we were down a few points and were able to hold things together as a team.  

“Blair is really positive. A real motivational guy on the ice. He kept saying, ‘OK, we’re not going to let them score. We’re going to steal, steal, steal’, and that’s what we did.”  

Young didn’t have a ton of expectations coming into the event. 

“Our goal was to make the playoffs. We just found our groove as a team, kept the communication up, and stuck together as a team.” 

Noseworthy is no stranger to national championship curling. He has represented Newfoundland & Labrador as skip at four national men’s championships, all before Brad Gushue dominated the scene on The Rock.  

Team British Columbia advanced to the final with an 8-7 win over Bryan Cochrane’s Team Ontario (Russel) in one semifinal. In the other semi, Noseworthy advanced with a 7-5 triumph over Prince Edward Island’s Dennis Watts (Cornwall). 

In the bronze-medal games, Cochrane prevailed 9-5 over Watts in the men’s division, while Gaines scored a 5-4 win over Hartwell in women’s play. 

Following the event, various awards were handed out. The Curling Canada sportsmanship awards were presented to one player at each position chosen by their peers who exemplify excellence in curling ability, sportsmanship and team spirit. 

Those awards were handed to: 

Women 

Skip – Geneva Chislett, Nunavut 

Third – Jamie Smith-Windsor, Saskatchewan 

Second – Alison Taylor, Nunavut 

Lead – Kacey Gauthier, Prince Edward Island 

Men  

Skip – Mark Noseworthy, Newfoundland & Labrador 

Third – Steve Bragg, Newfoundland & Labrador 

Second — Blair Jarvis, British Columbia 

Lead – Brad Kokoroyannis, Alberta 

The Most Valuable Player Awards were presented to Lindsay Thorne of Team Ontario (women) and Team Prince Edward Island’s Dennis Watts (men). 

The awards are given to the athlete(s) on each team whom the officials feel contributed the most to the team during the championship taking into account attitude, leadership qualities, team spirit, skill and performance. 

For archived event scores, roster information and other details, CLICK HERE.