Local curls her way into nationals

By Adelle Ellis, Times Reporter

All it took was the right team with good chemistry and a goal to make it to Nationals for one local young curler who found herself donning the coveted team Alberta jacket at the 2019 Canadian Under 18 Boys and Girls Curling Championships at the Glen Allan Recreation Complex in Sherwood Park, Alta. from April 1-7.
In their first year curling together as Team Wytrychowski of the Airdrie Curling Club, local Micayla Kooistra who plays second and teammates Emily Kiist, lead, Olivia Jones, third and skip Jessica Wytrychowski along with coach Joe Brown swept their way to victory throughout the recent curling and bonspiel season and won their way to Nationals following a good showing at play downs in Edmonton and U18 provincials in Medicine Hat.
Once at Nationals, the team battled through their six games in the round robin to place first in the B division with a 5-1 record. Their one loss in the round robin was to Manitoba, although due to their better record they placed ahead of them in the standings heading into playoffs.
“We actually lost to Manitoba in the round robin but after we won all our other games we came out with a better record than them and ended up first in the pool, and then had a tight game against them in the playoffs,” said Kooistra, adding that they lost 5-4 in their second game against Manitoba to knock them out of vying for a spot in semi-finals.
“Honestly, I think we all just had a bit of a rough game that time. We played amazing the whole week and we went into that game (with a) good mindset and our first four ends were really good, we were all playing 80 per cent or higher and were up 3-0, then we just hit a bit of a downfall and they raised their percentages so they outplayed us for the last end of the game.”
With individual game percentages hitting higher than 80 and even 90 per cent, Kooistra believes that given the opportunity again and without throwing a few rough ends, they could have taken it all the way.
Regardless of how the week went, the team still managed to clinch their goal of making it to Nationals and say they enjoyed the experience and were honoured to represent Alberta in the competition.
“It was our first nationals for our whole team actually so it was pretty cool. We have really good chemistry and we just had to know how to keep our team chemistry strong throughout the whole week in order to be successful and just work together. No matter what happened, we were proud to be there,” said Kooistra, adding that team chemistry-wise this team has been the best she has ever played with.
Skip Wytrychowski will be aging out of U18 next year and the team will continue to play with her in the U21 division. The rest of the teammates will also be picking up another player to continue curling in the U18 division with for another season.
Kooistra accredits her team’s success not only to their chemistry and strong work ethic, but also to the support they have received from their parents, sponsors and coach Brown.
Although their season is officially over, Kooistra continues sporting her Team Alberta jacket as representing one’s province is no small accomplishment but is a large sense of pride.
“The whole week was just such a great experience all-in-all. But getting to walk out in the opening ceremonies wearing that province jacket and meeting all new people from across Canada and meeting those curlers, that was pretty awesome,” said Kooistra. “This is the end of our season which is quite sad, but it’s exciting to start fresh next year.”