The Brown rink will become the first team from Kamloops to compete in the Canadian Olympic curling trials later this month in Halifax.
“It’s once every four years,” said Brown third Erin Pincott, whose team earned its berth at trials on the merit of its position in 2024–2025 Canadian Team Ranking System standings. “You never know if you’ll make another one of these. It’s the toughest event in Canada to win.”
Team Brown includes three curlers from the Tournament Capital — original members skip Corryn Brown, third Erin Pincott and lead Samantha Fisher — and second Sarah Koltun, a Kamloops resident from Whitehorse who joined the rink in time for the 2024–2025 campaign. Jim Cotter coaches the team.
Eight Canadian curling trials have been held since 1987 to determine four-person teams that advanced to Olympic Games and while none of them featured a rink from the River City, three Kamloopsians have participated.
Pincott competed as an alternate in 2021; Cotter, who is from Kamloops but no longer lives in the city, has curled at three trials (2005, 2013, 2017); and Matt Dunstone, a Kamloops resident from Winnipeg, has two trial appearances (2017, 2021) under his belt.
Cotter, who coached the South Korean mixed doubles curling team at the 2018 Olympics, also participated at the Canadian mixed doubles trials for the 2026 Games, partnering with his Kamloops-born daughter, Jaelyn.
Nobody from Kamloops has curled in the Olympics.
“To represent Canada, that’s been a dream of mine my whole life — goosebumps,” Pincott said. “I’m an Olympic junkie. Every four years when they’re on, I’m dialled in.”
The 2025 Montana’s Trials are scheduled to run from Nov. 22–30 in Halifax, with winners on the men’s and women’s sides advancing to represent Canada at the 2026 Olympic Winter Games, slated to run from Feb. 6–22 in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy.
Team Brown is part of a formidable eight-team field on the women’s side that includes Rachel Homan, Kerri Einarson, Kayla Skrlik, Kaitlyn Lawes, Kate Cameron, Christina Black and Selena Sturmay.
“We’ve put a lot of work in this season and in the previous season with our sports psychologist (Tracey Bilsky), which has been really great helping us mentally prepare, fine-tuning things so that we know that our minds will be in the right spot when we get there,” Koltun said.
Brown, ranked eighth in Canada and 24th in the world as of Nov. 1, had competed in five events this season as of the Chronicle’s publication deadline, qualifying for the playoffs in two of them.
The reigning B.C. champions are gleaning confidence from a runner-up finish at the PointsBet Invitational in October in Calgary, a big-money bonspiel that featured seven of the eight teams that will be at Olympic trials.
Brown rolled through round-robin play with a 4-0 record to secure its place in the title tilt, in which it fell 6-2 to Homan, the world No. 1 and trials favourite.
“We had them on the ropes in that final,” said Fisher, whose team earned $25,000 at the PointsBet Invitational. “Even though the scoreboard didn’t show it, a couple different shots or a couple made shots on our end and the score is flipped.”
Added Brown: “It’s just about making sure that when we have an opportunity, we’re really capitalizing on it.”
Brown, a four-time Scotties Tournament of Hearts participant, is no longer the young up-and-comer on tour, a two-time B.C. champion that has matured through soul-crushing defeats and monumental victories, with trophies and scars to prove it.
But the team is far from old, each member in their early 30s and perhaps, they hope, entering their curling prime at just the right time.
“I appreciate you saying we’re still young because it does feel like we have been around a while and experienced some really cool, positive, huge wins, but also had our fair share of lumps along the way,” Pincott said.
“And now, piggybacking off the PointsBet to build confidence … it does feel like the timing is right for us to really be competitive at this thing.”
DUNSTONE’S TIME?
While Brown will be an underdog at trials, Dunstone (The Sheriff) is among favourites to win on the men’s side, his team ranked second in the world and first in Canada as of Nov. 1.
“Every four years, you get to play for the biggest prize in curling,” said Dunstone, a two-time bronze medallist and two-time silver medallist at the Brier. “There’s no sugarcoating that it’s a much bigger event — and you feel it.”
Dunstone, third Colton Lott, and the Brush Brothers — second E.J. Harnden and lead Ryan Harnden — had banked more than $100,000 in 2025-2026 prize-purse earnings as of Nov. 1, thanks to a victory at the PointsBet Invitational and first- and second-place finishes at Grand Slam events.
“Everything’s about the Olympic trials this year,” Dunstone said. “Everybody knows that. And, yeah, being able to put ourselves in a lot of big finals against the world’s best is something that this team needed. This is certainly the most set up I’ve ever been to win an Olympic trials.”
Dunstone and Pincott, a curling couple, are in with a shot of donning the Maple Leaf together at the Games.
“Our poor cat would be left alone for a long time if we were to both go to the Olympics,” Dunstone said. “That’s obviously a dream scenario.”