Top-Ranked Retornaz wins Another Slam

Make it four for the Italians (photo: Anil Mungal, GSOC) and all three so far this season! Italy's Joel Retornaz skips the team, the number one ranked team in the World with Amos Mosaner at third along with Sebastiano Arman and Mattia Giovanella on the front end. They've wonn 51 games on the season against 7 losses, an utterly dominant record in a very busy season for the team from Trentino. In a low-scoring affair, the teams opened by blanking the first three end. A tightly fought chess match at this level, both teams pushing to get a feel for the ice while using their weapons to escape danger create intrigued games with the game. Retornaz broke through with two in the fourth end, leveraging last rock to get on the board. Whyte was held to a single point in the fifth end, but managed to get a steal in the sixth end to even the score. Retornaz was up to the task, managing a blank in the seventh end to maintain last rock advantage into the final end where they scored one for the 3-2 win. The WFG Masters is a repeated title for Retornaz who now has a career record of 12 wins and 2 losses with their title win in 2022. The accolades continue for the team with Retornaz the veteran bringing along three 'kids' with Ryan Fry joining this team as coach this season. No team has ever won all Grand Slam of Curling events in one season, though Kevin Martin did win 5 in a row at one point, just the changing order of events meant the team didn't collect all four. With the Co-op Canadian Open in Red Deer to come in January, Retornaz is now set up to make possible history and the way the team is playing fans can't bet against it. The HearingLife Tour Challenge in October, the KIOTI National in November and now the WFG Masters add to the title at the Baden Masters in August as events the team has won this season. Add in a runner-up finish at the Soo Curlers Fall Classic in October along with reaching the semifinals at the AMJ Campbell Shorty Jenkins Classic. Retornaz recently finished competing at the Le Gruyere European Curling Championships, coming in as the top seed, so for the Italians this would have been a disappointing finish, though seeing the team bounce back with another elite performance against the world's best teams. In the semifinals, Retornaz defeated Calgary's Brendan Bottcher 7-6 in an extra end and Whyte defeated Yannick Schwaller of Geneve, Switzerland, 9-4. In the quarterfinals, Whyte defeated Brad Gushue (St. John's, NL) 5-2, while Schwaller won 6-4 over Winnipeg's Matt Dunstone. Retornaz defeated Reid Carruthers (Winnipeg, MB) 5-1, and Bottcher defeated Magnus Ramsfjell (Trondheim, NOR) 8-3. Retornaz finished 3-1 in the 16-team round robin group qualifying round. In their opening game, Retornaz lost 6-3, then responded with a 7-5 win over Dunstone. Retornaz won 6-5 against Kevin Koe (Calgary, AB), then won 7-5 against Niklas Edin (Karlstad, SWE) in their final qualifying round match.