Bio: Harris, Jayda - Earns Gold With UWSP Champion Curling Team (2022)

Contact: Dolores (Mohr) Kenyon
E-mail: dolores@wiclarkcountyhistory.org 

Surnames: Harris, Guenther, Taylor, Cadwell, Armstrong

----Source: Clark County Press (Neillsville, Clark Co., WI) 3/30/2022

Harris Earns Gold With UWSP Champion Curling Team



Jayda Harris of Neillsville is a member of the UW- Stevens Point curling team that won the
USA Curling College National Championship. Submitted photo

By Valorie Brecht

Jayda Harris of Neillsville has found a fun new hobby that brought her success at the highest level. Harris recently compete on the UW-Stevens Point curling team, which took first place in the UISA Curling College National Championship.

“It was pretty crazy. It was wonderful,” said Harris about winning the championship.

The event took place at the Fargo-Moorhead Curling Club in Fargo, ND March 11-13. The top 16 college teams were invited to participate. To qualify, schools had to earn enough points throughout season by competing in a tour of point-earning bonspiels, or tournaments involving five or more curling teams.



The UW-Stevens Point curling team took home the gold after competing at the USA Curling National Championship in Fargo, NC. Shown are (l-r) Kayla Guenther, Neillsville High School alumna Jayda Harris, Meghan Taylor, Sawyer Cadwell and Jackson Armstrong. Submitted photo

The UWSP team played six games throughout the weekend. Harris, who is also the Clark County Fairest of the Fair Second Attendant, competed with four others from her school: team captain Kayla Guenther, Meghan Taylor, Sawyer Cadwell and Jackson Armstrong. Curling only requires four players, so Harris played in three of the games and Guenther played in the other three.

The tournament started with a round robin portion with four groups of four teams from each group advanced to the championship bracket. The UWSP curlers won games against Yale, Cornell and the University of Nebraska in the round robin portion of the tournament to advance to the playoffs.

In the quarterfinal, they defeated Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute 6-5. They advanced to the semifinal, where they defeated UW-Superior 8-3. In the gold medal game, they won against the University of Pennsylvania 13-2 in six ends.

The victory continued a tradition of excellence for UWSP, as the team has been to every national tournament possible since the Curling Association of UWSP was founded in 2013. This also marked the third championship title for UWSP, and it is the only team to have won multiple championships.

When Harris found out about curling, she never could have expected that she would end up going all the way to the national championship within six months of learning the sport. As a freshman on campus, she was just looking to get involved and thought it would be a cool activity to try.

“During the first few weeks of college, there was a club fair on campus. I saw the booth for curling and thought, ‘Oh, that sounds fun. Why not try it?’ So I went to a meeting about it. Then I went to a ‘Learn to Curl’ class and got hooked,” Harris said.

Harris really enjoyed curling and was a natural at it, so she was invited to be part of the team. She started attending weekly practices and went to weekend competitions throughout October and November. She also subbed on league teams at the Stevens Point Curling Club if needed.

Harris learned a lot about a sport that is not widely understood. To give a quick background, Curling is an international sport that dates back to 16th century Scotland. It involves sliding 44-pound blocks of granite also known as “stones” across a sheet of ice towards a target consisting of four concentric circles, also known as the “house.” The object of the game is to get as many stones as close to the center of the house as possible to score points.

The player “throws” the stone by pushing the stone along the ice and eventually releasing it. Teammates can then affect the path of the stone by using brooms to sweep the ice directly in front of the stone. Everyone except for the “skip,” or team captain, takes turns sweeping.

“The point is to melt the ice a little bit to get the rock to go where you want. You can carry it a long way if you’re good at sweeping, up to five meters. It’s very helpful to make sure it goes in the right direction,” said Harris.

The team takes turns throwing eight stones, with each player throwing two. After both teams have thrown eight stones, that is considered an “end” and the stones are scored. A game usually consist of eight or ten ends, although a team has the option to concede prior to that if it f eels it has no chance of winning. Of the six games UWSP played at nationals, four of the teams conceded prior to the end of the game.

Whichever team has the most points at the end of the game is the winner.

Curling has been referred to as “chess on ice” because of the strategy involved in placing stones to potentially block opponents.

Harris plays as the lead, meaning she is the first player on her team to throw stones.

“Not all shots are for point purposes. The first one you usually try to get to stop a little above the circle, because you’re setting up a guard above the circle,” she said.

She said that there is a lot of communication between the players, and it was crucial that everyone work together.

“It’s not individually competitive. It’s very team heavy, not individual heavy… Everyone needs to be equally important, or it just doesn’t work. You have to do it as a team; you can’t just have one all-star,” she said.

Besides that, she said another aspect of curling that she enjoyed was the overall camaraderie and getting to know people.

“It’s competitive at a certain level; but after every game you sit down and talk with your opponent. It brings a certain level of being friendly with your opponents… It doesn’t have to be about the game even, but just friendly talking.

“Getting to interact with people from all over has been a giant plus. It’s a great sport – a great community-type club. It fees just like a family.”

Harris graduated from Neillsville High School in 2021. She is studying psychology at UWSP.