Saskatoon to host 2025 Canadian Under-18 Curling Championships

Canada’s future curling stars will be heading to Saskatoon for the 2025 Canadian Under-18 Curling Championships, it was announced today by Curling Canada.

The Nutana Curling Club will play host to the event Feb. 16-22, attracting 42 teams — 21 male, 21 female — from across Canada.

“Since we introduced the Canadian Under-18 Championships in 2017, it has become one of most popular and eagerly anticipated events on our competitive calendar, as well as a crucial piece of our High Performance athlete development program,” said Nolan Thiessen, Chief Executive Officer of Curling Canada. “Saskatoon has proven time and time again that it knows how to put on amazing curling events, and we know that players, coaches and fans will have a memorable experience in 2025.”

For most of the players on the ice at the Nutana Club, it will be their first exposure to national championship competition, and since its inception seven years ago, it has featured numerous players who’ve gone on to success at the Under-21 level as well as on many of today’s top men’s and women’s high performance teams.

“I’m happy to help share that the Canadian Under-18 Curling Championships will be coming to Saskatoon and the Nutana Curling Club,” said Charlie Clark, Mayor of Saskatoon. “Our local clubs have done a fantastic job to grow and attract the best curlers in the game and this event will welcome the best upcoming players across the country to our city. This event will be a great opportunity to showcase our local curling culture, history, and our city as a whole.”

The provincial and territorial male and female Under-18 champions from Curling Canada’s 14 Member Associations (10 provinces, three territories, Northern Ontario) will receive invitations to compete in Saskatoon. The hosting Member Association, CURLSASK, gets a second invitation to the event. Lastly, the top-six ranked Member Associations based on the standings of the previous two events will receive invitations (rankings exclude the Host Member Association).

It will be the first time Saskatchewan has played host to the Canadian Under-18 Championships, but hardly the first major event staged in Saskatoon. Most recently, the city hosted the 2021 Canadian Curling Trials, which decided Canada’s Olympic four-player entries for the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

“Being able to see our country’s top up-and-coming players under one roof in Saskatoon will be a wonderful opportunity, and we’re excited to welcome the Canadian Under-18 Championships to our province for the first time,” said Steve Turner, Executive Director of CURLSASK. “The Nutana Curling Club and its membership and committed group of volunteers are ready to put on an event that we know will be a success on and off the ice.”

At the most recent Canadian Under-18 Championships, in February in Ottawa, teams from Manitoba (skipped by Shaela Hayward) and Newfoundland/Labrador (skipped by Simon Perry) claimed the female and male championships respectively.

In the six-year history of the Canadian Under-18 championships (the 2020 and 2021 events were cancelled during the pandemic), Alberta and Northern Ontario have each won two female national titles, with Nova Scotia and Manitoba each winning one.

On the male side, there have been six different winners — Newfoundland/Labrador, Nova Scotia, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Ontario and Northern Ontario.

“We have a lot of work to do to get ready, but we have a great base of members who want to put on a first-class show in 2025,” said Kory Kohuch, General Manager of the Nutana Curling Club. “We’re proud that Curling Canada has shown its faith in us to host a major event such as this, and we are ready to make the 2025 Canadian Under-18 Championships a special time for players, family members, coaches and fans.”