Nordin wins 46th RR Men’s spiel

Ken Johnston

It came right down to the last shot at the 46th Annual Rainy River Men’s Curling Bonspiel Sunday.
Tim Nordin’s rink, Clint Armstrong, Yogi McCormick and Mike Matthew of Rainy River faced Dale Morrison’s rink of Allan Wolanicki, Andy Sirman and Clayton Shannon.
Morrison drew first blood taking one in the first end.
Nordin raised one to count two in the second and take the lead 2-1.
Morrison answered back with two in the third, having to make a really nice outside draw to get the second point.
The fourth was blanked by Nordin, who then scored two in the fifth. Morrison tied at 4-4 in the sixth. Nordin blanked it in the seventh to set the stage for a spectacular finish.
With Nordin lying two, Morrison used his last rock to draw in front of those two. He was a little heavy and it was questionable as to whether he was shot or Nordin was. For a moment it looked like Nordin would call the game without throwing his last shot and let a measurement decide the championship. But then he chose to throw a perfect draw and did to win 5-4.
In the B event it was another close game with it coming right down to skips’ rocks.
Fred Foulger’s rink scored one in each of the first three ends before giving up a four ender to Glen Armstrong’s team. But that 4-3 lead was short lived as Foulger returned fire to get a three ender and lead 6-4.
A determined Armstrong chipped away at Foulger’s lead scoring one in the sixth and two in the seventh. Leading 7-6 coming home, Armstrong did not have the hammer.
Foulger threw up a gauntlet of rocks and Armstrong did his best to break them down and hold onto his lead. However, with his last rock Glen bumped one of Foulger’s rocks into second shot and that gave Foulger the game. Fred did throw his last rock and won 8-7. Rounding out Foulger’s team was Brian Russell, Allan Stone and Otto Budziak.
In the C event the only out of town team to make the playoffs, Peter Grant’s rink, defeated Aaron Armstrong’s Rainy River rink 9-4.
It was close after two ends being tied at 2. Then Armstrong gave up a five ender in the third to give Grant a 7-2 lead.
Armstrong picked up 1 in the fourth, gave up one in the 5th and scored one in the 6th. Grant scored another one in the 7th and that saw Armstrong’s bunch resign at 9-4. Curling with Grant (of Winnipeg) was Larry and Dave Armstrong of Rainy River and Art Berard of Edmonton.