Reid Carruthers, Braeden Moskowy, Derek Samagalski and Colin Hodgson are riding a six-game winning streak at the 2018 Viterra Provincial Men’s Curling Championship.

Number seven on Sunday afternoon will send the 2016 champions to the Brier in Regina next month,

Carruthers defeated B.J. Neufeld, Matt Wozniak and Denni Neufeld 7-3 in the 1-2 page playoff game Saturday night at the Winkler Centennial Arena.

It was the fourth year in a row the two teams met in the 1-2 game.

The West St. Paul foursome have won the three of the four.

Carruthers got two in the second end, stole two in the fourth and drew for another deuce in the seventh end.

A steal of one in the eighth sealed the deal.

“That was probably our best game of the week,” said Carruthers. “We didn’t miss omuch, put lots of pressure on them and obviously got a lot of breaks. The steal of two was kind of out of nowhere.”

It was the fifth game game in row that Neufeld, Wozniak and Neufeld played as a threesome.

Skip Mike McEwen is recuperating from a bout of chickenpox.

Neufeld, Wozniak and Neufeld will meet reigning provincial junior champion J.T. Ryan in the semifinals Sunday morning at 8:30 a.m.

It’s highly doubtful McEwen will play Sunday.

Ryan, who stole one in the tenth end and beat Steve Irwin of Brandon 5-3 in the 3-4 page playoff game, is thrilled to get a chance to play the two-time defending champions.

“It’s really exciting," said Ryan who is 6 and 0 in elimination games in Winkler. "You watch those guys on the television all the time and to be one of the last ones in an event with them is something special. We’ve already accomplished way more than what we could of wanted at this so we’re just going to go out there and have fun tomorrow.”

The winner will face Carruthers in the final at 3 p.m.


2018 Viterra Championship All-Stars (photo courtesy CurlManitoba)
lead Colin Hodgson, second Travis Brooks, third Jacques Gauthier, skip B.J. Neufeld, Clayton Dreger (Golden West)