For the past few years, the junior men's curling scene in the Yukon has been dominated by one strong Whitehorse team and one strong Watson Lake team, with Whitehorse claiming the edge in head-to-head battles and the right to attend the Canadian junior curling championships.

This year, the Yukon Curling Association will try something a little different, as the rivals join together to represent the territory.

Watson Lake's Scott Cole will coach the new junior rink, which is made up of Whitehorse's Trevor Prosko and Alex Peech, and Watson Lake's Toby Reams and David Giesbrecht. Prosko, Peech and Reams are all 18 years old, while Giesbrecht is just 14.

The idea came about because both sides couldn't find a complete team to field for the championships, but all four of the young athletes were keen on curling competitively this season.

Prosko, who is slated to skip the team, said he was approached by Derek Charlton, who runs the Whitehorse Curling Club, about making a team. It's most likely his last year to represent the Yukon at the junior nationals, so he decided to give it a shot.

The first few people in Whitehorse he tried curling with didn't work out, and then Peech came to mind. The two had curled together previously at junior nationals in 2004 and 2005.

'I've curled with (Peech) the last three years, so we know each other well,' said Prosko, in an interview following practice Wednesday. 'Then Derek found Toby and David.

'(Toby and David) play with a lot of heart and they quite determined to succeed at the national level. Toby took this whole month off from work just to curl. That shows a lot of dedication and that's a big thing in my opinion.'

Reams and Giesbrecht, who were part of a team which represented the Yukon at the 2004 Arctic Winter Games have been curling pretty much every day since they found out they were going to nationals at the beginning of December.

Along with Cole, they've been travelling to Whitehorse once a week to practice as a team, but the rest of the time they take to the ice in Watson Lake.

'Getting the chance to go to the nationals is just awesome,' said Giesbrecht. 'Now we're just trying to get prepared.'

Peech admitted he hasn't had as much time this year to focus on curling as in past years, which is why he didn't volunteer in the first place. But he's been squeezing it in since he got the call from Prosko last month, in order to take one last run.

'For me, it was also a personal choice, because I wanted to give (Reams and Giesbrecht, who have never been to nationals) the experience. I want to help them out with all the pressure when we go down there, because they're going to be coming up and representing the Yukon over the next couple of years.'

While it took a few practices for the group to get comfortable curling with each other, all of them feel they have a fairly strong team heading into Thunder Bay, Ontario this weekend, although Giesbrecht admitted they weren't really too sure about it at the start.

'But actually, our team dynamic is coming together quite well now. Both of our teams were fairly good last year and I think joining the two teams together makes it just as good, if not better.

'We've heard that a lot of the teams at nationals are new this year, so we could do really well.'

Reams believes they have a stronger team than last year heading into nationals and he's also hoping for a good showing on the weekend. Both him and Giesbrecht are looking to break the Yukon's previous best performance of four wins at nationals, and if anyone from the Yukon rink got named to the All-Star team, that would just be icing on the cake.

'We just need to work on our focus and get back to the basics. We can't get ahead of ourselves and be too complex with our shots, just keep it simple.'

Cole has been working on focus and the mental aspects of the game quite a bit with the athletes over the past few weeks, which Prosko said is somewhat different from coaches he's had in the past.

'They're all different types of coaches. Scott is more into the mental way of coaching, whereas Orest (Peech) and Gord (Moffatt) are more technical. Each coach has taught something different. Scott places a heavy emphasis on team fundamentals and team dynamics.'

Cole said one of the toughest parts of curling is 80 per cent of it is mental, so team dynamics can make a huge difference for the Yukon team if they get a handle on it.

'All of these athletes are decent curlers, so there's not much you really have to tweak. It's about positive communication, positive actions and just getting them to believe in themselves.

'They're all great kids. I really think if they put their mind to it, they can win at least four games. That's what I'd like to see.'

Rather than throw out numbers, or talk percentages, Prosko would rather try to enjoy the experience this time around. The first two years he was been at junior nationals were very stressful, he said, so the important thing for him is to just go out there and have fun.

'If we win some games, that will be a huge bonus. This is sort of my one last kick at the can.'

The Yukon team left for Thunder Bay Thursday morning and will play their first games of the championships Saturday against Ontario and Saskatchewan.

They will close out the round-robin at the 2006 M&M Meat Shops Canadian junior curling championships with games against B.C. and Northern Ontario, Jan. 26.

The final is scheduled for Jan. 29.

The Yukon Curling Association elected not to send a junior women's team to this year's championships, as the women's program is in a rebuilding year.