Staff
In order to play for a national title, Raymond Roy’s rink is going to need some help from fellow teams.
The Fort Frances rink, which includes third Dave Broman, second Butch Wensley, and lead Patrick Briere sat at 2-2 after losing 7-3 to Manitoba yesterday before downing the Northwest Territories 7-4 this morning.
The two losses put Roy in a precarious position in terms of advancing to the playoff round.
Only the top two teams from each pool move on, so Roy will need to win his remaining two games and hope that both Alberta and British Columbia, who have one loss apiece, lose at least once more to force a tiebreaker.
Roy lost 8-5 to Alberta on Wednesday, and will face B.C. in his final group play match tomorrow.
Roy also will face Yukon (0-5) later today.
Yukon gave B.C. all it could handle this morning, stealing one in the eighth to force an extra end before falling 5-4.
In Roy’s only game yesterday, a visit with the neighbours didn’t do the locals any good as they fell to undefeated Manitoba.
Manitoba used the hammer to take a 1-0 lead in the first end, then stole two in the second and another one in the third to go up 4-0.
Roy climbed back into the match with three in the fourth to cut the lead to one, but Manitoba scored singles in the last three ends to wrap up the victory.
Roy’s rink got off to a better start this morning against the Northwest Territories, putting up a pair in the first before stealing one in the second to jump ahead 3-0.
The Territories came back with a single in the third, but Roy put up two more in the fourth to make it 5-1.
N.W.T. got to within 5-3 with a deuce of their own in the fifth but Roy equalled the challenge with two in the sixth.
Roy then held his opponents to a single in the seventh, with the teams shaking hands after that.
