With the new year came a fresh opportunity for the Marauders to showcase their curling prowess on home ice
To start the new year, the Marauders curling team hosted the first curling invitational of the year. The McMaster Invitational took place during the first weekend of January, bringing together fierce competition from multiple universities across Ontario.
The invitational competition served as an exciting opportunity for both the men’s and women’s curling teams to sharpen their skills and build momentum ahead of the Ontario University Athletics championships this year. “We had a great weekend going 4-1 with some pretty controlled wins.” said Ben Winchester, one of the co-presidents of McMaster’s curling team.
We had a great weekend going 4-1 with some pretty controlled wins.
Ben Winchester, Co-President
McMaster Curling Team
Over the two-day period for which the invitational took place, the men’s team faced the University of Toronto, Trent University and York University once each and Brock University twice. They ended the invitational with an admirable four wins and one loss, finishing third after a 5-1 win against Brock in the playoffs. The women’s team performed just as well, ending the invitational with four wins and one loss.
The team worked on many aspects of their game prior to the invitational on the weekend. Namely their pregame practices.
“Pregame practices are a major component of curling tournaments. They typically are not included in invitationals, however they were in the one over the weekend [McMaster Invitational]. They determine who has the last shot in the first dent which is a huge advantage. Also at the end of practice each team also throws a draw and the draw score is used for tie breaking purposes.” said Winchester.
Their pregame practices turned out to be effective as the Marauders ended up having hammer in three of their matches.
Looking forward, Winchester expressed that the men’s team is hoping to work on being a more offense-oriented team. This shift aims to capitalize on scoring opportunities and to put more pressure on their opponents.
“We’re a more conservative and defensive team. We don’t typically have a lot of rocks in play which results in our wins being narrow for the most part. We’ve recently focused on upping our offense to score some big ends and we saw some glimpses of that in the invitational. Hopefully this is something that we can keep building on.” said Winchester.
As one of the more tenured members on the team in his fourth year, Winchester naturally has taken up more of a leadership role.
“It’s a little bit of pressure, but I love it. The most important thing is probably holding each other accountable on the ice.” said Winchester.
Last year, the Marauders didn’t have the best performance at the OUA's, having placed 12th.
“We weren’t expecting to do that well last year, however the 12th place finish was still a disappointment,” said Winchester.
Although the curling team has stayed the exact same, the men’s have been performing a lot better than they were during this time last year. This year they have a win percentage of 66.7 per cent compared to last year's of 23.3 per cent. “We’re playing a lot better this year and that's probably down to this group having more time to mesh together and understand each other,” said Winchester
We’re playing a lot better this year, and that's probably down to this group having more time to mesh together and understand each other.
Ben Winchester, Co-President
McMaster Curling Team
Winchester is eyeing playoff success with the men’s team during his last year of his undergraduate career. However the Marauders will face a tough game against Laurier, who have won the OUA championship seven times in the last decade. “I’d really like to make the playoffs. And once you’re in, it's kind of just taking it game by game from there.” said Winchester.
After a successful invitational at home, the Marauders men's and women's curling teams will take on the Brock Invitational on Jan. 18 and 19 ahead of this year's OUA championships on the weekend of Feb 6, 2025.
McMaster women’s curling team wraps up yet another successful season with a win at the OUA championship, places fifth at U Sports Championships
The McMaster University women's curling team just wrapped up another impressive, and perhaps underappreciated, season. Notably, the team won the 2023 Ontario University Athletics Championships and finished fifth at the national U SPORTS Championships.
Hosted by Ontario Tech University, the OUA Curling Championships took place over Feb. 3 to Feb 5. The championships kicked off with a four-game round-robin on Friday morning followed by quarter-finals, semi-finals and finals.
By the end of the round-robin, the Marauders had a record of three wins and one loss. McMaster went on to win against the Western University Mustangs in the quarterfinals with a score of seven to three and the Queens University Gaels in the semifinals, eight to one.
The championship game came down to a close competition between McMaster and the Laurentian University Voyageurs on Sunday afternoon. After some back-and-forth action, McMaster broke the three-to-three tie in the eighth and final end to win the 2023 OUA Championships.
The OUA title is the fourth in McMaster women’s curling program history. A few Mac athletes received recognition with Evelyn Robert named as OUA first team all-star, while Grace Lloyd and Madelyn Warriner were named OUA second team all-stars.
“We won OUAs in 2020 as well and we had a couple of returning players from that year, and we also have some really talented players that just came in for their first year. So we were really excited going into it and were pretty confident that we could do well. We put in a lot of work practicing and training off-ice as well throughout the season,” explained Warriner.
The team training schedule consists of two hours of on-ice training, dry-land training with McMaster’s high-performance centre for athletes and a weekly open league game at the Dundas Valley Golf and Curling Club. Many of the athletes also play on competitive teams outside of McMaster on the weekends.
Following the OUA Championship, team headed to the U Sports Championships in Sudbury, Ontario which took place between Mar. 15 to Mar. 19. The national championships featured teams from Dalhousie University, the University of Alberta and the University of Prince Edward Island.
“It's a bit more of a surprise going into [the U Sports championship] I would say. You're not entirely sure what each specific team is going to bring to the table, but that's kind of what makes it so exciting. You don't really know what to expect and you really just focus on yourself and how you can personally prepare to be the best that you can, so that when you go into it you can perform at your top level,” said Warriner.
The Marauders played a total of seven games at the U Sports Championships. The final record was four losses and three wins against University of Victoria, University of PEI and Toronto Metropolitan University. It’s worth noting that McMaster was unable to clinch a semi-final spot against Laurentian, despite defeating the home team twice in the OUA Championships.
“They had been playing very well all week. We had seen it and it was reflected in their record — they were top of the table. So we knew going into it that we had to play really well if we wanted to beat them and they just had the edge on us that day,” explained Warriner.
“They had been playing very well all week. We had seen it and it was reflected in their record — they were top of the table. So we knew going into it that we had to play really well if we wanted to beat them and they just had the edge on us that day,”
Madelyn Warriner, McMaster Women’s Curling Skip
Ultimately, McMaster finished fifth with University of Alberta taking home the 2023 U Sports championships. However, two McMaster athletes earning All-Canadian honours with Evelyn Robert named to the All-Canadian First Team and Grace Lloyd to the All-Canadian Second Team.
Looking ahead, Warriner and the McMaster women’s curling team have two key goals. To defend their OUA Championship title and to improve on their U Sports performance next year.
After last year's curling invitational was cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions, McMaster took the opportunity to host the yearly event at Dundas and preformed phenomenally
Although curling is a sport that can mostly be played in the winter months, it’s back in full swing this January. Just last week, McMaster University hosted their first curling invitational in years after last year's event got cancelled due to COVID-19 restrictions.
This year, both the men’s and women’s teams got to experience the type of competition they’d come against in the upcoming OUA’s, each playing five games against other universities.
“Last year we were meant to play the invitational at Dundas in January, but it unfortunately got cancelled due to lockdowns at that time. This time, we hosted the event to multiple universities, with Mohawk included, and got a lot of playing time where we clashed against five teams,” said Ben Winchester, a second-year men’s curling player.
Over the two-day period for which the invitational took place, the five games for the men’s team were against Western University, Trent University, York University, Ontario Tech University and University of Toronto. By the end of the weekend, only three games had been accounted for, with the team picking up a win, a draw and a loss.
However, the women’s team had a much more impressive performance, grabbing an impressive four wins and one draw from five games.
“I would say that the way we played during the invitational provided a lot of competition to other universities that took part. It certainly was a good weekend for us, and it gave us confidence ahead of the Brock invitational that is happening in a few weeks,” said Winchester.
Although it is his second year with the curling team, Winchester debuted for the OUA curling team this season. His performances from last season certainly proved to be worthy enough to take part in the highest calibre men’s squad for the upcoming games.
“I am currently in my second year of studies at McMaster, and it’s my second year as a curling team member. However, last year I was a part of the JV squad whereas this year I got the opportunity to partake in the strongest OUA squad that we have,” said Winchester.
As with almost every other athlete, progress is a very important thing to Winchester. The expectations and improvement for the second-year athlete are an important aspect in his varsity experience.
“Personally, I expect myself to further improve this season. I think that it should be every athlete's goal to push themselves to the max and achieve the most that they possibly can. As for the rest of the team, I think that we have a lot of potential to do well this season, especially in the upcoming OUA championships,” said Winchester
Although currently the curling season is at full swing, after the OUA championships the team is expected to go on their off season. Since curling requires very icy conditions in a rink, this is not widely offered during seasons other than winter.
“During the off season, we tend to go our separate ways. Everyone goes home and tries to get as much practice as possible, although it can be hard. It can be hard to find a place to do curling during hotter seasons,” said Winchester.
After a successful invitational at home, McMaster men's and women's team are looking to garner more experience at the Brock Invitational, which takes place on Jan 21. and Jan 22. This will be their final preparation before the main event at the OUA championships which are happening on the weekend of Feb 10.
