Four remain! 

Male semifinal matchups set at 2025 New Holland Canadian U-20 Curling Championships 

What began as a field of eighteen of Canada’s best male youth teams has been whittled down to all but four at the 2025 New Holland Canadian U-20 Curling Championships. 

Playoff action kicked into gear Saturday afternoon from the Gerard “Turk” Gallant Arena at Summerside, P.E.I., with two male quarterfinal matches on the docket, seeing team Nova Scotia #2’s Calan MacIsaac (8-1; Truro) defeat Team Ontario #1’s Tyler MacTavish (7-3; Waterloo) 9-3 and Team Saskatchewan’s Dylan Derksen (7-2; Martensville) down Team Manitoba #1’s Jace Freeman (5-4; Virden) 8-5. 

For Team Nova Scotia #2, the quarterfinal win marks its eighth in a row on its 2025 New Holland U-20 campaign. 

“We’re dialed in,” said MacIsaac. “We’ve got that killer mentality right now. I wouldn’t want to be the person playing us.” 

MacIsaac’s Truro team – alongside vice-skip Nathan Gray, second Owain Fisher, lead Christopher McCurdy, and coach Craig Burgess – are now set to face Team Nova Scotia #1’s Zach Atherton (6-2; Halifax/Chester) in a semifinal Saturday at 7 p.m., (all times Atlantic). Team Nova Scotia #1 secured a bye to the semi by finishing as the top team in Pool B and were not in action Saturday afternoon.  

Team Saskatchewan #1 and Team Ontario #1 had also finished Pool B with matching 6-2 records after pool play’s conclusion Friday, but the three teams all had equal 1-1 records head-to-head, resulting in LSD scores to break the tie.  

MacIsaac is keen to face his provincial mates in the semifinal. 

“They’re Nova Scotia #1 and we didn’t get a chance to play them at provincials,” said MacIsaac. “But now is our time to get a crack at them. Just going to go out there and play them like anybody else.” 

Meanwhile, Team Saskatchewan’s Dylan Derkson will face Team New Brunswick’s Rajan Dalrymple (7-1; Oromocto) in the other semifinal. Team New Brunswick earned a bye to the semifinal by finishing first overall in Pool A. Team Nova Scotia #2 shared a 7-1 record after pool play but lost its head-to-head match with Team New Brunswick back in draw 1, breaking the tie. 

And though Team Saskatchewan – completed by vice-skip Logan Sawicki, second Tyler Derksen, lead Gavin Martens, and coach Brad Kennedy – never trailed in the quarterfinal versus Team Manitoba #1, and even led 5-1 after five ends, the win wasn’t always assured. 

“We played good for the first eight,” said Dylan Derksen. “Got a little shaky in the last few but got it done. We just controlled the whole game and kept putting pressure on them. That lead was definitely a nice buffer for the later ends.” 

Team Saskatchewan’s win over Team Manitoba #1’s Freeman was a repeat of the 2024 New Holland Canadian U-21 Curling Championship male bronze medal game at Fort McMurray Wood Buffalo, Alta., that saw Freeman win the bronze 7-5 in an extra end. 

The win at this year’s New Holland U-20s for Team Saskatchewan is a little dose of retribution seeing that the win keeps his team in contention for the gold medal. 

“We all wanted to win the game really badly,” said Derksen. “Of course, this is maybe a little more of an important game, but we definitely wanted to come out firing no matter who we played.” 

The men’s gold medal final is set for Sunday at 11 a.m., while the women’s gold medal will take place at 3 p.m., the same day. Bronze medal matches for both genders will run concurrently. 

The female semifinals will take place Sunday morning at 9 a.m. 

Playoff action from the 2025 New Holland Canadian U-20 Curling Championships continues Saturday evening with two female quarterfinal matches at 7 p.m. 

Select games will be streamed live on Curling Canada’s YouTube page found here.             

Live scores, standings, team rosters, schedule information and more can be found at the event website here.