Jackie Pearson was a long time member and tireless volunteer who held many positions at Schooner over the years. He was an integral part of resurrecting the club after the military pulled out and in growing it into what it is today. We are very happy to honour Jackie's memory with this spiel.
Spiel Wrapup
The Jackie Pearson Memorial Doubles Spiel was held at the club on January 16th and 17th and saw a full complement of sixteen teams taking part. With that many teams it was necessary to split them into two divisions. A random draw was done to determine what division teams would be in and who they would face in their first game. Play got underway on Friday evening with all sixteen teams seeing their first action of the event. The first draw, taking place at 6pm, saw teams from division one square off. Gary and Jen cook defeated Sean MacPherson and Ralph Neville while Bill Farr and Kirk McNeil were winners over Frances Ford and Lynn Kelly. Division two got started at 7pm with Meranda Fitzgerald-Bullen and Jeremy Brow winning over Justin Humphrey and Val MacIntyre on one sheet while Russell Fitzgerald and Leo Fraser took down Mel and Rick Windsor on the other. For Rick Windsor, it was a return to the Schooner and the sport of curling after a few years away. Welcome back Rick. Moving back to division one at 8pm we had Dane and Julissa Rudderham defeat Lori and Dave Rich and Brian Laughlin and Gordie Cormier move on with a win over Terrance Nicholson and Dave Devoe. The final draw of day one at 9pm would see Walter Nichols and Benito Delorenzo lose to Bryant Cormier and Keith MacEachern while Julie Cormier and Robbie Biron would win over Jenna MacNeil and Stephen Leslie. All winners of Friday’s games would stay in the top bracket of their respective divisions while losers would drop to the consolation bracket of those divisions. Saturday play got underway early, starting at 10am in division one and 11:15 for division two, with all of the losing teams facing off in a must win game. The two-loss elimination format meant another loss for any of these teams would mean their weekend would be over. Winners in the division one draw were Kelly/Ford who defeated Neville/MacPherson and Nicholson/Devoe who took down Team Rich while division two saw Team Windsor win over Humphrey/MacIntyre and MacNeil/Leslie over Nichols/Delorenzo. Bernadette Cormier played in place of Jenna MacNeil who was forced to drop out of the spiel. These winners would move on to the consolation bracket semi-final and play the losers of the semi-final games from the top brackets which were scheduled for the 12:30 and 1:45 draws. The top bracket semi-finals in division one had Farr/McNeil taking on Team Cook and Team Rudderham facing G. Cormier/Laughlin. Winners would face off for the division one title while losers would play in the consolation round semi-final games. Farr/McNeil and G.Cormier/Laughlin would win their games to face off in that division championship game. In division two it was Fitzgerald/Fraser coming out on top in their game against Bullen/Brow and B. Cormier/MacEachern winning over J. Cormier/Biron to finalize the matchup in the division two final. Division one would see its finals in both the top and consolation brackets go at 5:30pm while division two finals would take the ice right after that. Winners of each divisions top brackets would then face off in a game to determine the overall spiel winner. Before that we needed to determine the consolation bracket finalists in each division. In division one, Team Rudderham defeated Ford/Kelly to earn the right to take on Nicholson/Devoe who took down Team Cook to earn their way in to the consolation final and in division two it would be B. Cormier/Leslie besting Bullen/Brow to move on to face off against J. Cormier/Biron who were winners over Team Windsor. The consolation finals would see the winner take home $110 in prize money while the losing team would pocket $40. In division one, Team Rudderham got an early lead and looked to be in control but Nicholson/Devoe wouldn’t go quietly and ended up tying the game in the final end. A draw to the button to decide a winner was required. Terrance Nicholson drew to the back eight on his attempt but Dane Rudderham was heavy and went through the house, giving team Nicholson/Devoe the victory. In division two, the teams decided not to play the consolation championship game and split the prize money. The top bracket final in division one between Farr/McNeil and G. Cormier/Laughlin was closely contested with the score going back and forth. Farr/McNeil got out to an early lead after three ends but Laughlin/Cormier fought back and were leading by one heading home in the sixth without hammer. In the sixth, Farr was lying two, enough to solidify the win, when Cormier stepped up to take his last shot. Gordie was trying to remove an opponent’s stone to possibly force a tie and a sudden death draw to the button but racked up on a guard in front of the house and conceded the two points and the win to Farr/McNeil. In division two, the team of Fitzgerald/Fraser would control play for the most part and defeat B. Cormier/MacEachern to earn their way in to face Farr/McNeil for the overall Jackie Pearson Memorial title. In that final game, Fitzgerald/Fraser continued to control play as they had done in the division final, getting out to an early 4-0 lead. After Kirk McNeil got two points back in the third end, Leo Fraser got a single in four that put his team up 5-2. The fifth end is when tragedy struck for Fitzgerald/Fraser and the game took a huge turn. Kirk McNeil was playing stones into the house early in hope to build an end to get his team back in the game. A few key missed take outs by Russell Fitzgerald left McNeil lying five in the house with only one Fitzgerald stone to come. Fitzgerald attempted another take out, hoping to eliminate at least two stones to keep the game close, but came up empty and allowed McNeil the chance to draw for six, a feat in doubles equivalent to an eight-ender in standard team curling. McNeil made no mistake and drew his final stone in for the coveted six, giving his team an 8-5 lead heading home. Bill Farr played a more defensive end in the sixth to prevent Leo Fraser from scoring the three points he needed to tie and was successful with only one opponents rock in the house when Fraser was down to his last shot, leading to Fitzgerald/Fraser conceding the game and leaving Kirk McNeil and Bill Farr as the 2026 Jackie Pearson Memorial Spiel champs. The winners took home $160 and the runners-up took home $130. The losers in the division finals. B. Cormier/MacEachern and G. Cormier/Laughlin, took home $100 each. Congratulations to all of our finalists and to our eventual winners. It was a great weekend of curling at the club. Thank you to everyone who took part, to everyone who helped out with organizing and running the event, to the ice crew, bartenders and everyone else who helped in any way. We hope to see everyone back again next year to remember Jackie Pearson and take part in the 2027 edition of his memorial spiel.
January 16-17
Team Entry $60 per Team Enter as a team of two - Limited to the first 16 teams Draw Format (subject to change based on number of teams) Cash prizes Lunch Included on Saturday
This Spiel usually fills quickly. Sign up at the club, send us an email or reach out on Facebook to reserve your spot.
