UTICA – When SUNY Poly senior Blake Hagberg walks across the commencement stage at the Wildcats Fieldhouse in May, his legacy will include leading the college’s curling team to place second in the 2019 USA Curling College National Championship. 

The SUNY Poly Curling Club took home the Silver Award following the championship held March 8-10 at Broomstones Curling Club in Wayland, Mass.

Hagberg, the team’s skip, and teammates Jeremy Zhang (vice), Aaron Bailey (second), Jackson Lanzafame (lead) and Byran Chang (alternate) defeated six teams throughout the weekend in the playoff rounds including teams from the University of Wisconsin – Steven’s Point, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard University, University of Oklahoma, University of Minnesota and North Dakota State University. 

The team came up up short, however, in the championship against North Dakota State University with a final score of 2-6. 

Despite the loss, Hagberg sees the second-place win as a major victory in a sport in which victory can be unpredictable regardless of how well a team has placed in the past. He estimates Olympic curlers only accurately make between 70 and 80 percent of their intended shots.

“Curling is not really a sport where the better team is always going got win,” Hagberg explains. “Every game is different and it’s not easy to make your shots every time.”

Having curled since the age of 12 in his hometown of New Hartford, N.Y., the Business Administration and Finance major with a minor in Accounting had only taken a few years off from curling before founding SUNY Poly’s Curling Club as a freshman. 

“Curling is a sport where, if you participate or partake in a lot of it one year and then don’t do so much the next year, the skill level drops off drastically,” he said. “It’s something you really need to continue to work at to continue to stay at that skill level or improve.”

Hagberg competed in 12 tournaments prior to the championship as part of his preparation. 

“It was a great game played by both teams, and congratulations once again to NDSU for winning the gold,” he said. “We would also like to give special thanks to all those who supported us at home.“