Stepping in & Stepping Up

NEW BRUNSWICK’S KELLY PLAYING SUPER SPARE AT MIXED DOUBLES NATIONALS

“Rachel didn’t want to come,” joked Tyler Tardi. 

In reality, because his mixed doubles partner – Rachel Homan – won the Scotties Tournament of Hearts and is busy at the Women’s World Championship, Tardi needed a new teammate for Mixed Doubles national championship being held this week in Fredericton, N.B. 

“I called up a local legend to carry me along, instead,” said Tardi, referring to Perth Andover, New Brunswick native Andrea Kelly. 

“I was excited right away about the opportunity,” said Kelly, who has skipped New Brunswick at the Scotties ten times. “But I was also super busy with work, and had to clear that up before I could commit – especially having just gotten back from the Scotties.” 

A few emails later, a new partnership was confirmed, and now the thrown-together team is off and running at the nationals, posting a perfect 3-0 record to start after an afternoon 9-6 win over Manitoba’s Chaelynn Kitz and Brayden Stewart. 

“To be honest, I don’t think we’d ever spoken to each other before those emails,” said Tardi. “I was a bit worried because we’re both a bit on the introverted side, but we’re chatting a lot more as it goes on. The dynamic has turned out great.” 

“Personality-wise, I think we gelled pretty well from the beginning,” said Kelly. “We both take it easy out there, and we’ve had a lot of good moments so far. We’re just going to keep building on that.” 

Tardi and Kelly (who had barely any mixed doubles experience prior to the event) sit atop the Pool A standings with former champs Laura Walker and Kirk Muyres. The 2018 winners are also perfect through three games, following Monday’s 9-3 victory over Buckingham, Quebec’s Audrey Laplante and Jasmin Gibeau. 

In Pool B, only the Nova Scotia provincial champions Marlee Powers and Luke Saunders remain unbeaten. In Pool C, every team (including Jennifer Jones/Brent Laing and Lisa Weagle/John Epping) has at least one loss. 

Pool D, 2019 national champions Jocelyn Peterman and Brett Gallant opened with two wins, as did Gimli, Manitoba’s Kadriana and Colton Lott. Veronique Bouchard and Jean-Francois Charest (Chicoutimi, Que.) also sit at 2-0 in that group. 

After each pool completes the eight-team round robin, the top 12 teams in the 32-team event will advance to playoff rounds beginning on Thursday. The winner of each pool will advance directly to the semifinal.  

Three draws a day will be live-streamed on Curling Canada Plus (http://plus.curling.ca) while scores and standings can be found at http://curling.ca/scoreboard .