February 10, 2025
HAMILTON, ON: The Niagara Knights curling teams made the quick trip to Hamilton for
the OCAA Curling Championships hosted by Mohawk College at the Dundas Valley
Golf and Curling Club. The event started on Wednesday, February 5 th and the playoffs
wrapped up in the evening on Sunday, February 9 th .
The Knights had teams participating in each division with Joshua Custers (skip), Carter
Chopin (vice), Aidan Luk (second), and Tyler Ramos (lead) making up the men's team;
Julia Reichelt (skip), Alexa Desrochers (vice), Carmen Warboys (second), Briana
Szigeti-Jonasson (lead), and Paige Taylor (alternate) making up the women's team;
William Mitchell and Victoria Pedro making up mixed doubles 2 team; and Noah LeBrun
and Julia Markle making up the mixed doubles 1 team.
The men's team started and ended the event playing the two toughest teams and
suffered an 8-2 loss to the silver medal winning Humber Hawks in game 1 and a 7-1
loss to the gold medal winning Mohawk Mountaineers in game 7. The Knights took
wins against the Confederation Thunderhawks and the Fleming Phoenix while losing
very close games to both the Fanshawe Falcons and the Durham Lords. Those four
losses would ultimately put them out of playoff contention as they finished the week 2-5.
The women's team would also finish round robin play with 2 wins, but that was enough
for them to finish 4 th and punch a ticket to Sunday playoffs. They fell to the unbeaten
Fanshawe Falcons in the qualifier game, although arguably playing their best game of
the week. The ladies could not find their draw weight on Sunday afternoon and lost the
bronze medal game to the defending bronze medalist Mohawk Mountaineers. The vice
on the women's team, Alexa Desrochers, was recognized for her outstanding play all
week as she was named a second-team championship all-star.
Mixed doubles team 2 consisted of two brand new curlers who had a fantastic week of
learning about competitive curling and thoroughly enjoyed meeting and competing
against other student athletes in the OCAA. They finished their week 0-7 but had a
couple of close games and many great learning opportunities. Mixed doubles team 1
had more combined competitive curling experience than team 2, although Noah had
never competed at a level as high as OCAA curling prior to this week. Team 1 went 4-3
on the week, knocking off Durham, Humber, and Fanshawe along the way to qualifying
for the playoffs. The playoffs saw the team face the number 1 seed Sault 1 in the
qualifying round, where Noah and Julia just didn't quite have their 'a game'. That set up
an all-Sault gold medal game while Niagara 1 and Mohawk competed for the bronze
medal. This game was a different story for the Knights where they had their draw
weight down pat, and it came down to the last rock in the last end to decide who would

take home bronze. At the end of it all mixed doubles team 1 found themselves sitting 1
at the end of the 8 th end to take the 8-7 win and bring home the bronze medal.
The team of curlers and their coaches had a great week at the Dundas Valley Golf and
Curling Club and cannot wait to build on this momentum moving forward to continue to
grow and develop the Niagara College Curling program for years to come.
For more information on Knights varsity programs, please visit us at www.goknights.ca.