Madison Bear

Madison Bear
Curler
Born (1997-04-26) April 26, 1997 (age 27)
Portage, Wisconsin
Team
Curling clubPortage CC,
Portage, WI[1]
SkipMadison Bear
ThirdAnnmarie Dubberstein
SecondElizabeth Cousins
LeadAllison Howell
Mixed doubles
partner		Aidan Oldenburg
Medal record
Representing  United States
Women's Curling
World Junior Curling Championships
Silver medal – second place 2016 Copenhagen
United States National Championships
Bronze medal – third place 2016 Jacksonville
Bronze medal – third place 2019 Kalamazoo
Bronze medal – third place 2021 Wausau
United States Mixed Doubles Championship
Silver medal – second place 2021 Wausau

Madison Bear (born April 26, 1997) is an American curler from Portage, Wisconsin. As a junior curler, Bear was a two-time United States champion and a World runner-up.

Career

Bear first competed at the United States Junior Curling Championship in 2015, as skip of a team consisting of Jenna Burchesky at third, Allison Howell at second and Annmarie Dubberstein at lead. Despite being newcomers on the national stage, Team Bear made it to the finals where they lost to defending champion Cory Christensen.[2]

The following season, Bear joined Christensen's team as lead. The team also included Sarah Anderson and Taylor Anderson.[3] With Team Christensen, Bear won her first World Curling Tour event, going undefeated at the 2015 St. Paul Cash Spiel.[4] At the 2016 Junior National Championship, Bear earned her first Junior National title when the team finished with a perfect 11–0 record, never needing to play a full ten end game.[5][6] Winning Junior Nationals earned Team Christensen a spot at the Women's National Championship in Jacksonville, Florida, where they earned the fourth seed in the playoffs with a 3–3 round-robin record. They defeated Jamie Sinclair in the 3 vs 4 page playoff game,[7] but then lost to Nina Roth in the semifinals, earning themselves the bronze medal.[8]

Winning the Junior National Championship also earned Bear her first opportunity to represent the United States at the World Junior Championships in Copenhagen. Bear's team finished the round-robin with a 7–2 record, good enough for the second seed in the page playoff system. In the 1 vs 2 playoff game, Team Christensen defeated the number one seed Canada, skipped by Mary Fay. This gave the United States a path straight to the final where they ultimately faced Canada again, this time losing 4–7 to earn the silver medal.[9]

For the 2016–17 season Bear was back to skipping her own team, this time composed of Cora Farrell, Cait Flannery, and Lexi Lanigan.[10] Team Bear got silver at the 2017 Junior Nationals, losing to Annmarie Dubberstein in the final. Bear still returned to the World Juniors as alternate for Dubberstein's team and finished in 7th place.[11]

In her final season as a junior curler, Bear joined back with her original juniors teammates: Dubberstein, Burchesky, and Howell.[12] They won the gold medal at the 2018 United States Junior National Championship, earning Bear her third straight trip to World Juniors.[13] At the 2018 World Junior Championships in Aberdeen, Scotland, Bear and her team just missed the playoffs, finishing in fifth place.[14]

Out of juniors for the 2018–19 curling season, Bear rejoined Christensen's team as lead. The team also added a new coach, Canadian Darah Blandford, in her first year with the USCA High Performance Program.[15] Team Christensen was chosen to represent the United States at the third leg of the Curling World Cup in Jönköping, Sweden; the Curling World Cup was a four-part international tournament held around the world throughout the curling season.[16] There they finished with a 3–3 record.[17] At the 2019 United States Women's Championship they finished the round-robin with a record of 5–2, good enough for the third seed in the page playoffs. In the 3 vs. 4 playoff game they defeated Stephanie Senneker's team by one point, 9–8. In the semifinal match against Nina Roth's team, it came down to the last stone, but, as she did three years prior, Roth came through with the win, resulting in the bronze medal for Team Christensen.[18][19]

Shortly after the season ended, it was announced that Christensen's team was dissolving and Bear would again skip her own team. For the 2019–20 season Jenna Burchesky and Lexi Lanigan rejoined Bear, along with Katie Dubberstein and Emily Quello.[20] Bear failed to qualify for the 2020 United States Women's Championship, getting knocked out of the Challenge Round with a 2–3 record.[21] The next offseason brought another team change for Bear as in June 2020, the United States Curling Association announced she would be the skip of the new women's U-25 national team. The U-25 team program, which stands for under 25 years old, was added in 2020 as a new part of the High Performance Program with the intention of bridging the development gap between juniors and women's curling. Bear also was selected, along with teammate Andrew Stopera, to be the U-25 mixed doubles national team for the 2020–21 season.[22]

Despite a difficult year marred by COVID-19, Bear made the most of her 2020–21 season. At the "bubble" in Wausau, Wisconsin, Bear won the silver medal at the 2021 US Mixed Doubles Championship and the bronze medal at the 2021 US Women's Championship. The silver medal qualified her and Stopera for the 2021 US Mixed Doubles Olympic Trials.

Teams

Women's

Season Skip Third Second Lead Alternate Coach Events
2014–15 Madison Bear Jenna Burchesky Allison Howell Annmarie Dubberstein 2015 USJCC 2nd place, silver medalist(s)
2015–16 Cory Christensen Sarah Anderson Taylor Anderson Madison Bear Christine McMakin Dave Jensen 2016 USJCC 1st place, gold medalist(s)[23]
2016 USWCC 3rd place, bronze medalist(s)[24]
2016 WJCC 2nd place, silver medalist(s)[25]
2016–17 Madison Bear Cora Farrell Cait Flannery Lexi Lanigan Rebecca Miles 2017 USJCC 2nd place, silver medalist(s)
Annmarie Dubberstein Christine McMakin Jenna Burchesky Allison Howell Madison Bear 2017 WJCC (7th)
2017–18 Madison Bear Annmarie Dubberstein Jenna Burchesky Allison Howell Leah Yavarow[a] 2018 USJCC 1st place, gold medalist(s)
2018 WJCC (5th)
2018–19 Cory Christensen Vicky Persinger Jenna Martin Madison Bear Darah Blandford CWC/3 (5th)
2019 USWCC 3rd place, bronze medalist(s)
2019–20 Madison Bear Jenna Burchesky Katie Dubberstein Lexi Lanigan Emily Quello Darah Blandford
2020–21[22] Madison Bear Annmarie Dubberstein Taylor Drees Allison Howell Jordan Moulton 2021 USWCC 3rd place, bronze medalist(s)
2021–22 Madison Bear Annmarie Dubberstein Taylor Drees Allison Howell 2021 USOCT (6th)
2022–23 Madison Bear Annmarie Dubberstein Elizabeth Cousins Allison Howell 2023 USWCC (4th)

Mixed doubles

Season Female Male Events
2019–20 Madison Bear Andrew Stopera 2020 USMDCC (8th)
2020–21 Madison Bear Andrew Stopera 2021 USMDCC 2nd place, silver medalist(s)
2021–22 Madison Bear Andrew Stopera 2021 USMDOCT (9th)
2023–24 Madison Bear Aidan Oldenburg
2024–25 Madison Bear Aidan Oldenburg

Notes

  1. ^ for WJCC

References

  1. ^ "USA Curling National Team Athletes". USA Curling. Retrieved May 17, 2024.
  2. ^ Kolesar, Terry (Spring 2015). "Minnesota boys, High Performance girls capture 2015 Junior Nationals titles" (PDF). U.S. Curling News. pp. 12–13. Retrieved Jan 3, 2020.
  3. ^ Kolesar, Terry (May 22, 2015). "High Performance Program team for upcoming season announced". USA Curling. Archived from the original on May 26, 2015. Retrieved Jan 30, 2020.
  4. ^ "Champion: Christensen wins 2015 St. Paul Cash Spiel". CurlingZone. Retrieved Jan 30, 2020.
  5. ^ DeGeorge, Matthew (Jan 26, 2016). "Broomall's Anderson sisters curling national champions again". The Delaware County Daily Times. Retrieved Jan 30, 2020.
  6. ^ "UW-BSC's Bear wins Junior National title". Baraboo News Republic. January 26, 2016. p. 8. Retrieved May 19, 2020.
  7. ^ "CURLING: Bear advances to semifinals at USA Curling National Championship". Portage Daily Register. Feb 11, 2016. Retrieved Jan 30, 2020.
  8. ^ Davis, Terry (Summer 2016). "Brown, Clark rinks earn national titles". U.S. Curling News. p. 14. Retrieved Jan 30, 2020.
  9. ^ "VoIP Defender World Junior Curling Championships 2016". World Curling Federation. Retrieved Dec 27, 2019.
  10. ^ "Portage pair gunning for title". Portage Daily Register. January 14, 2017. p. B1. Retrieved May 19, 2020.
  11. ^ "VoIP Defender World Junior Curling Championships 2017". World Curling Federation. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  12. ^ Davis, Terry (2017-05-19). "High Performance Program athletes for upcoming season announced". USA Curling. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  13. ^ Potter, Doug (2018-02-04). "Violette, Richardson Repeat as National Junior Champs". Granite Curling Club. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  14. ^ Monteith, Austin (2018-03-10). "US men take fourth at World Juniors". Grand Forks Herald. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  15. ^ Pavitt, Michael (2018-08-21). "USA Curling add six coaches to high performance programme". Inside the Games. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
  16. ^ "TEAM SHUSTER THE STAR ATTRACTION FOR HOME CROWD IN OMAHA". Curling World Cup. 2018-09-28. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
  17. ^ "Curling: Duluth curlers out in World Cup". Duluth News Tribune. 2019-02-02. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
  18. ^ Davis, Terry (2019-02-15). "Finals set at 2019 National Championships in Kalamazoo". USA Curling. Archived from the original on February 7, 2020. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
  19. ^ Perelman, Rich (2019-02-17). "CURLING: Schuster wins seventh U.S. Nationals title; Sinclair takes third straight". The Sports Examiner. Retrieved 2020-02-06.
  20. ^ "Bemidjians named to USA Curling High Performance Program". The Bemidji Pioneer. 2019-05-23. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  21. ^ "Bear 2-3 at USA Women's Challenge Round". CurlingZone. Retrieved 2020-02-20.
  22. ^ a b "U-25 NATIONAL TEAM PROGRAM". Team USA. June 24, 2020. Archived from the original on July 17, 2020. Retrieved September 18, 2020.
  23. ^ Davis, Terry (Spring 2016). "High Performance teams sweep to gold". U.S. Curling News. pp. 8–9. Retrieved Jan 3, 2020.
  24. ^ "Brown wins 2016 USA Women's National Curling Championship". CurlingZone. Retrieved Jan 3, 2020.
  25. ^ Davis, Terry (Summer 2016). "Double silver for Team USA". U.S. Curling News. p. 9. Retrieved Jan 3, 2020.