Throwing stones at favouritism for Ferbey
Curlers stage protest after Edmonton rink gets special break

Adam Daifallah
National Post

Tuesday, January 13, 2004

Some of Canada's top curlers are complaining that Randy Ferbey's Edmonton rink was given special treatment at last week's Strauss Canada Cup of Curling due to a scheduling conflict, while similar requests made by other teams were denied.

At least three teams -- Wayne Middaugh, Jeff Stoughton and Russ Howard -- unsuccessfully asked Canada Cup organizers about delaying their arrival times for the Kamloops cashspiel, which Ferbey won Sunday.

According to weekend reports, several teams held a 10-minute "sit-in" protest on the ice Friday night to show their displeasure with the perceived favouritism shown to Ferbey's rink, which had a scheduling conflict with the Alberta playdowns. Organizers allowed Ferbey's rink to throw rocks at a later time and under different ice conditions in a draw-to-the-button shootout, the results of which were used to break round-robin ties for the playoffs.

The rules for the spiel stipulated that if a team missed the shootout on Tuesday morning, they would automatically get last place in the shootout and lose hammer in all round-robin games.

Russ Howard said his team received notice that their first game would be Wednesday, but later found out they played Tuesday at 7 p.m. Howard was having trouble changing his travel arrangements. He said he asked if the draw could be changed in case he couldn't make it for the first game, but was told no.

Howard, who beat Ferbey in the round robin but finished with an identical record of 3-1, was faced with having to win four games in a row while Ferbey, by virtue of his better score in the shootout, advanced directly to the semi-final, with a guaranteed $7,500 more in winnings. Howard's suggestion that the three teams that tied for first place in his pool --Howard, Ferbey and Stoughton -- simply redo the shootout to resolve the issue was denied, which led to the protest.

According to Howard, Canada Cup committee chairman Norman Daley told the skips that Ferbey was late because of weather, then sent out a memo explaining that the team had asked for more time due to the playdown conflict.

"Randy did absolutely nothing wrong, he knew his team couldn't make it. It was just disorganized. I don't hold any animosity for anybody," he said in an interview from Moncton.

Middaugh said his team unsuccessfully asked twice for permission to arrive late. The Tuesday morning shootout required them to arrive Monday night and the team didn't want to miss a full week of work.

"My request was to show up late, because the event started on Wednesday. For me it made no sense to show up Monday," said Middaugh, who lost in Saturday's semi-final. "For some reason they [Ferbey] got exempt from the rules everyone had to play by. It would have saved us three days. It definitely rubbed a lot of curlers the wrong way."

Stoughton's rink is also claiming to have asked to show up late."We didn't play until Wednesday at 2 p.m. We asked to come in late and do a later shootout. We wanted to be there Tuesday night, it would give us an extra day at work," said the team's vice, Jonathan Mead.

"I'm not skeptical enough to think there was favouritism, it's a case of the left hand not talking to the right hand. Some things weren't necessarily thought through very well."

Mead suggested that too much is at stake on the draw-to-the-button shootout, especially at an event where two critical berths --one at the Olympic trials, the other at next year's Continental Cup -- were at stake.

"It's too much to be given on the basis of a draw, for one team to jump that far. That's not an appropriate way to do it," Mead said. "All we want is a level playing field."

Ferbey's team, meanwhile, claimed to have done nothing wrong.

"We followed the rules exactly the way they were written in the manual. There was no unfair, special treatment," Ferbey vice Dave Nedohin told the Calgary Herald.

Daley, the chairman of the event, said he regretted the way events transpired. He briefly resigned from his post for a short period over the incident, but returned hours later.

"I learned a lot this week about communication. We could do a better job," Daley said from Kamloops. "Overall, it was a fantastic event with great curling, but it doesn't leave a great taste in my mouth."

It might be easy to get the impression that the Canadian Curling Association, which officially sanctions the Canada Cup, allowed Ferbey's team the delay because it didn't participate in the Grand Slam boycott of the Brier, while the teams whose requests were denied did. But Daley said the CCA was not involved in the decisions.

"If other teams had required the same concession, they would have had the same concession," CCA chief executive officer Dave Parkes said last night. "I don't think it's a matter of one team [being given special treatment].:

The tie-breaking system will be changed for the Canada Cup in the future, Parkes said.

adaifallah@nationalpost.com

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