Times Colonist from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada • 2

'st EDITION After 5:00 p.m. and weekends 380-5344 or 380-5345 TIMES-COLONIST Sunday. April 3. 1 988 A1 3 Hill II llllllll Ico field SENICK mmmt 'vmmf. 'mS 'Hf'ti 'Tsv Jit I' 'mmxv Tim-Colonist news service NORTH VANCOUVER Mike Wood and his rinkmates knew they were going to have only one shot at a Canadian junior men's curling championship, so they made the most of it.

The Victoria Curling Club rink capped an incredible comeback Saturday at the North Shore Winter Club by winning its eighth straight game to capture B.C.'s first national junior men's title in 27 years. Wood and third Mike Bradley, second Todd Troyer and lead Greg Hawkes turned in a trademark cool performance under pressure as they downed Craig Kochan of Northern Ontario 6-2 in the final, televised nationally on CBC. In the women's title game, LaDawn Funk of Spruce Grove, made a bridesmaid of Jennifer Lamont for the second year in a row by beating her Winnipeg rink 6-3. Both winners will represent Canada in the first combined world junior championships next March at Mark-ham, Ont. Wood's win in the men's final put the finishing touches on his rink's version of Miracle On Ice, the title of a book and movie based on the U.S.

hockey team's Olympic victory under coach Herb Brooks in 1980 at Lake Placid, N.Y. At one stage of last week's round-robin, the Victoria rink was at 3-4 and its chances of making the the playoff round seemed remote at best. But Wood, who has developed a reputation as a solid shotmaker, squeaked into a four-way tie for third place by finishing the round-robin with four straight wins and a 7-4 record. On Friday, the business administration student at Camosun College beat both Manitoba and Nova Scotia in tie-breakers before eliminating Randy Bryden of Saskatchewan in the semifinal. Despite Friday's heavy schedule, fatigue didn't seem to affect the Wood rink Saturday.

The Victoria curlers took control in the sixth end when Kochan tried a double takeout and got only one stone, giving Wood a steal which put him in command at 4-2. Wood opened the game with a single in the first end. Kochan countered with a deuce in the second but Wood came right back with two of his own in the third and then took control with the steal in the sixth. The Victoria rink added singles in the seventh and ninth ends as Kochan scrambled to get back into the game. But the Northern Ontario rink ran out of rocks in the 10th end.

Wood said television lights softened the ice Saturday and his team was better able to adjust than Kochan's. "It made the rocks curl more and it worked to our advantage," Wood said. "We just kept on our roll and it worked right through. "They got a day-and-a-half off," Wood added, referring to Kochan, whose rink watched as Wood battled his way into the final, "but our added experience on the ice helped. Fatigue wasn't a factor for us." Kochan said his team was flat in the first three ends.

"We just couldn't get anything going," said the Northern Ontario skip, "and once they were up three, it was pretty well over. Wood's rink, coached by Gordon Hooey, became the first B.C. team to win a Canadian junior championship since Jerry Coughlin of Oliver did it in 1961. The win was even sweeter for the Victoria curlers because all four are 19 and in their final year of junior eligibility. It also ended some frustration for Wood, who was just one win away from qualifying for the Canadian championship in both 1986 and '87, when he lost in consecutive B.C.

finals. The Victoria team has had the advantage of honing its game in the tough Metro Toyota Super League this season, an experience which helped Pat Sanders win a world women's title last year. Wood's rink is scheduled to arrive at Victoria airport today at 10:15 a.m. The team will proceed directly to the Victoria club, where a reception to honor its victory will be staged. Everybody is welcome to attend the reception.

In the junior women's final, Funk's rink became the first Alberta team to win the title since Cathy King of Edmonton in 1978. Both women's finalists also curled in the 1987 championships at Prince Albert. Funk missed the playoffs while Lamont threw third stones and current rinkmate Janine Sigurdson was second on Karen Purdy's Winnipeg rink which lost in the final. "I'd rather not be in it than come in second," said a depressed Lamont after the loss. "That's the hardest place to be.

It really is, because you're right up there and do almost as well as the next team and get nothing for it." Despite Wood's victory, none of the Victoria curlers cracked the men's all-star team, which was based on round-robin play. Ian Power of Prince Edward Island was the all-star lead, Craig Fiske of Saskatchewan was the second, Mike Desilets of Northern Ontario the third and Craig Piercey of Newfoundland the skip. Alberta placed three players on the women's all-star team. Laurelle Funk was chosen lead, Cindy Larsen second and LaDawn Funk tied for top skip with Manitoba's Lamont. Isabelle Gagnon of Quebec was the all-star third.

The Canadian Curling Association also announced that the 1989 Pepsi junior nationals will be held March 25 to April 1 at the Heather Curling Club in Winnipeg. AS IF URGING the stone along, Mike Wood of pionships while Northern Ontario skip Craig Ko-Victoria shouts to his sweepers during Saturday's chan and third Mike Desilets look on. Wood took final of the Canadian junior men's curling cham- the title with a 6-2 win over Kochan. Sweeping year into the past Amid the wailing fanfare of bagpipes, Heather Houston of Thunder Bay began a chase for the women's world curling title this weekend in Scotland. Pat Sanders, meanwhile, quietly left her home in Victoria, on a camping expedition to Long Beach where there would be the sound of waves crashing on the shore rather than applause for a shot well made.

Sanders, like Houston this year, was the Canadian skip at the 1987 world championship. Her rink of Georgina Hawkes, Louise Her-, linveaux, Deb Massullo and alternate Elaine Dagg-Jackson won the title, signalling a beginning rather than end to their season. As world and Canadian champion, the Sanders' rink was caught up in a whirlwind of competition and appearances that ended only when Houston won the national title a few weeks ago. She beat Sanders 6-5 in the final of the Scott Tournament of Hearts at Fredericton. That sent Houston to Glasgow.

The Sanders' rink cashed in return tickets to Victoria and, a few days later, announced it was breaking up. Herlinveaux has decided to take a year off from competitive curling, Massullo plans to wed and move to Tumbler Ridge while Hawkes expects to join or form another rink. Sanders hasn't reached a decision on competitive curling. That will come with time. She's content to deal with matters like her weekend trip.

Sitting in front of a campfire is more appealing right now than standing in front of reporters, explaining the last curling game. Sanders was constantly asked for explanations last year. Sometimes, she claimed, the words were twisted by the media and even fabricated to fit a reporter's story. It was part of the jump from a well-known local rink to one of national and international stature that happens so often and so quickly in curling. There are no junctures in the trip to catch your breath, no gradual adjustments to the outside pressures that build in relation to success.

One week it's zone playdowns and shortly after that, it's a world championship. Suddenly, there's more to deal with than a sheet of pebbled ice and 16 rocks. It can be unexpected, like walking into a dark room and blinking as the light switch is thrown. It started at the world championship when Sanders and company realized that the Canadians were one rink facing a psychological war each time out. The Europeans would be just as happy to return home with a tale of victory over Canada as they would with a title.

There were no niceties and talk of getting together for a beer after the game. The Europeans didn't even wear deodorant, not because of an earthy custom, but to throw the Canadians off. In Canada, Sanders admits to some "great experiences" but she also tells you there was an overiding sense of pressure to prove that the rink belonged, that it wasn't a fluke. An example came at the Canadian trials for the Winter Olympics. Sanders was a world champion but did not receive a bye because of that status.

She simply became another name in a special spiel and was eliminated in semifinals of the playoff round. The stature of Sanders' rink did earn it a trip to Europe for competition and to spots like Fredericton for challenge matches. But, ultimately, nothing was free. Sanders and the members of her rink were often left to handle travel arrangements and to hammer out arrangements in their personal lives. Curling can be a great game but it's not a career.

Mortgage and car payments still come due whether you're curling for a can opener in the club bonspiel or for a world title. Sanders says juggling a schedule as Team Canada, with commitments and an image to uphold, along with one at her job, was a large strain. "In the long run it was a good year," she adds. "You have a tendency to fade the bad things out." There might be regret, on a competitive level, and maybe some of the trying moments have been glossed over. But you still get the impression that the weekend in Long Beach provided a personal sense of relief for ositive thinking isn't enough for Canucks were a lot of nights when you really didn't know who was going to come out.

We're supposed to be professionals and we have a job to do to prepare ourselves to play hockey. You can't rely on the guy beside you to get you up for the game." Although the Canucks will have the No. 2 pick in the June entry draft, their highest draft position since 1970, it's likely the player they select won't be ready to help next season. "We've still got a lot more question marks than exclamation points," McCammon concedes. the season and distanced himself from his players.

Some players privately questioned McCammon's ability to coach. "One thing we've got to do is get bigger. We don't have anybody who can bang heads with (Joel) Otto or (Mark) Messier. That's a concern." Rich Sutter, traded to Vancouver from Philadelphia two seasons ago, thinks attitudes must change if the Canucks are to get better. "I'm not knocking anybody, but the mental preparation before games was just awful," Sutter says.

"There The Canadian Press VANCOUVER Brian Burke admits he's still wet behind the ears. His first year as a hockey administrator with the Vancouver Canucks was a sobering and humbling experience, as it has been for first-year general manager Pat Quinn and coach Bob McCammon. Burke admits the Norman Vincent Peale approach to building a winning hockey team didn't work, and it will take much longer than Burke, the team's 32-year-old director of hockey operations, Quinn and McCammon the third time in four seasons. The record of 25-46-9 was identical to the one that got both Bill LaForge and then Harry Neale fired as coach in the 1984-85 season. That will be McCammon's fate, too, if there is not marked improvement next season.

The heat will be on Quinn and Burke to ice a better lineup next season, and on McCammon to get more out of his players. As a motivator, McCammon was a failure. As loss mounted upon loss, the Canucks coach, numbed by the hammering, seemed resigned to write off imagined last September. Believing a positive attitude and not much else suddenly could make for dramatic improvement was wrong, Burke says. "That was naive of me, and I take full responsibility for that," he says.

"I said we were going to come in and change the world. But you don't change the world. You've got to change the horses first." The Canucks ended their season with a 6-1 win over Minnesota on Friday night at the Pacific Coliseum to finish with 59 points in 80 games for ey misses cost Canadian women in world opener in Fredericton, where she lost the opening game and struggled through much of the tournament until catching fire after slipping into the playoffs with a win in her last game of the round robin and putting together a five-game win streak. "We were a lot more consistent today than we were that day," said Houston, a 29-year-old graphic artist. "Very few shots were missed.

"Tracy (lead Tracy Kennedy) had a tough time because there is one horrifying grinder (rock). She missed a lot of hits with that rock. It was just impossible to throw." HEHIUUI The Canadian Press GLASGOW, Scotland Beating Canada at the women's world curling championship is every team's hope. But it was doubly so for Christine Allison, a 26-year-old from Kirkcaldy, on Scotland's east coast, when she took advantage of key misses by Canadian skip Heather Houston in the ninth and 10th ends to steal a 6-5 win Saturday in the opening round of the women's championship. "We hoped for a good game with Canada, but we didn't know how well we could play," Allison said of the first-round upset, spurred on by a packed house of more than 700 supporters at the Summit Centre.

The Canadian rink, from Thunder Bay, defending the world title for the fourth time, appeared edgy throughout despite scoring two in the sixth end for a 4-3 lead and stealing another in the seventh. But a miss by Houston in the ninth Langley, overcame Annick Mercier of France 7-3. "I thought we had lost it a couple of times," said Allison, whose inexperience in international play left some doubt that her team would be able to perform at the world level. "Fortunately, she allowed us back into the game until the end." Allison admitted it was a major accomplishment for the Scots to defeat a Canadian team. The last team to win the world title other than Canada was a Swiss squad skipped by Muller at Moose Jaw in 1983.

"I think it's hard because the pressure is on Canada," said Allison. "It's the Canadian team's first international experience the pressue is still on them as it is for us. "People wondered if we could stand up to the pressure, and fortunately we did." For Houston, it was a replay of her first game at the Canadian nationals allowed the Scots to steal one and tie the game, and another huge miss with her last shot in the 10th end saddled the Houston foursome with the loss. The results of the only draw scheduled Saturday left the Scottish rink atop the 10-team, round-robin standings with West Germany, Denmark, Sweden and the United States, all at 1-0. The trailers at 0-1 along with Canada were Finland, Switzerland, Norway and France.

In other opening round action, Andrea Schopp's West Germans losing finalists to Canada in the last two world championships including last year to Pat Sanders' Victoria rink at Chicago battled back from a 5-1 deficit after four ends to edge Anne Eeerskainen of Finland 9-7, Anette Norberg of Sweden beat Norwegian veteran Anne Joeten 6-4, Denmark's Helena Blach surprised Erica Muller of Switzerland 9-1 and the American squad from Seattle, skipped by Nancy Quebec diver wins gold Giants are assured of opening sellout The Associated Press SAN FRANCISCO The San Francisco Giants' baseball home opener Thursday against San Diego became a sellout Saturday when fans bought up the last 6,500 seats. More than 1.2 million tickets have been sold in advance of the season. The Giants open Monday in Los Angeles. (More basebullA14) The Canadian Press WINNIPEG David Bedard of Pointe Claire, clinched the gold medal in men's 10-metre platform diving at the Canadian national senior winter diving championships Saturday. It was the second year that Bedard, 22, won the event.

Second place went to Jeff Hirst, 24, from the University of Toronto Diving Twenty-four-year-old Jeff Bacon, a Saskatoon diver who competes for Winnipeg's Pan-Am Diving Club, captured third. In the women's event, 18-year-old Anna Dacyshyn of the University of Toronto grabbed the gold medal. Chantal Laforest of the Camo Diving Club in Montreal came second, while third place went to Angela Borthwick, 19, of Winnipeg. 'What was that big crash in the kitchen?".