From part-time to full-time duty.
Red Deer’s Jocelyn Peterman will be tossing second stones for Heather Nedohin in the Alberta Scotties women’s curling championship Wednesday to Sunday at the Lacombe Arena after sharing the position with Jessica Mair for most of the season.
“I joined the team in August and we had a five-man team going for the first part of the season. We’re just a four-man team now,” said Peterman, who skipped a Red Deer foursome to the 2012 Canadian junior women’s championship.
With Mair unable to commit to the rink on a consistent basis, Nedohin approached Peterman in August with the intent of bringing an insurance player on board. Peterman was only too happy to accept the offer.
“I went to all of the events and we kind of traded off for the first half of the season,” said Peterman, 21. “But Jessica had too many work commitments to continue (into and through this week’s provincials).”
The Nedohin crew has yet to take top honours in a World Curling Tour or Grand Slam event, but have qualified for the playoffs in four of five ‘spiels while earnings $35,250, good for sixth place on the money list.
“We’ve been pretty successful. We haven’t won this year but hopefully that will change this week,” said Peterman, a fourth-year kinesiology student at the University of Calgary. “I’m looking forward to playing so close to home. Hopefully we get some good crowds.”
Nedohin has been one of Alberta’s most successful female curlers since the mid ‘90s and has made six appearances in the Scotties Tournament of Hearts Canadian championship, winning in 1998 at Regina and three years ago at the Centrium. She finished third in both of her appearances in the women’s worlds and skipped her junior squad to the women’s title in the 1996 world juniors in Red Deer.
“This is an awesome opportunity for me and it’s been very exciting playing with this team,” said Peterman. “I’ve learned a lot so far while playing a new position, so it’s been a really good experience.”
Peterman skipped her junior women’s foursome for several years. Her job was to call the game while front-enders Rebecca Konschuh and Kristine Anderson took care of sweeping duties.
“I never swept much until this year, but I’m enjoying it,” she said. “I played with the same girls in juniors for a long time so it’s been different getting used to new teammates, but it’s been really good.”
The Nedohin foursome, which qualified for the provincials via the Canadian Team Ranking System, have drawn a bye in Wednesday’s 9:30 a.m. opening draw and will face the winner of the game between Nicky Kaufman of Edmonton and Delia DeJong of Grande Prairie in the evening draw, set for 6:30 p.m.
Also competing in the Alberta Scotties are rinks skipped by Chelsea Carey, who won last year’s Manitoba title, Tiffany Game, Karynn Flory and defending champion Val Sweeting, all of Edmonton, Teryn Hamilton, Crystal Webster and Shannon Kleibrink of Calgary, Casey Scheidegger of Lethbridge and Deanne Nichol of Peace River.
Brittany Tran, who played third for Peterman’s junior team, is tossing lead rocks for Scheidegger, while Konschuh is Webster’s lead and Amy Janko of Red Deer is DeJong’s third.
The Alberta Scotties concludes Sunday with the championship final slated for 2 p.m.