Nordberg wins RR ladies spiel by inches

Ken Johnston
Editor

Curling is truly a game of inches and the final stones thrown at the Rainy River Ladies Bonspiel proved that Saturday.
The Donna Ivall rink squared off against the Shona Nordberg rink in the “A” finals. Ivall stole three in the first when Nordberg missed a raise. But a determined Nordberg foursome chipped away at that lead over the next three ends
Using the hammer Nordberg made the raise in the 2nd end to count one. In the next end Ivall had the hammer and was light with a draw and let Nordberg steal one.
In the 4th Norderg’s luck hung on as the usually very accurate shooter Ivall missed a double take out getting only one of them. That let Nordberg count one and the game was tied 3-3.
In the 5th Ivall was narrow on a front raise and let Nordberg count three to take a 6-3 lead.
Ivall’s team fought right back the next end with Ivall drawing in perfectly to count three and tie the game again.
In the 7th it was Nordberg’s turn to miss a double take out. That left Ivall lying one and ahead 7-6 coming home.
With her last rock Nordberg had a chance to draw in and win the game. But she overthrew by about two feet and only counted one to tie the game for the third time at 7-7.
Instead of playing an extra end they chose to throw skip’s rocks. Nordberg threw first and was just biting the button.
Ivall then threw and what looked like a carbon copy shot of Nordberg’s came to a stop about 12 inches away from the button. She essentially lost the game by inches.
In the “B” event it looked like the Julie Tiboni rink was going to walk away with it ahead 6-2 after the 6th. But Patti Bonhomme scored four in the 7th to tie it up and then stole two in the 8th two win 8-6.
In the “C” event Cathy Seguin’s rink defeated Cheryl Mathews’ rink 8-2 after six ends.