With all three of last year’s medal winning teams in the field once again at the World Junior Curling Championships which take place from April 12 to 21 in Italy, Scotland’s Team Carson are fully aware of the scale of the challenge confronting them in the men’s event.
However, as they prepare for what is a doubling as a test event at the venue for next year’s Winter Olympics in Cortina, Orrin and Logan Carson, Archie Hyslop, Charlie Gibb and alternate Jake MacDonald believe they can at least match what they achieved on their World Juniors debut when they made it onto the podium in 2023.
“We have played in this event twice before, so hopefully that will put us in a good position throughout the week,” said 19-year-old skip Orrin Carson. 
“We can use the experience from those two years to get us through some tough situations that we know we will face, but we are confident in our own abilities and how well we have been playing over the last few months and hopefully we can carry that into this week and come back with a medal.”
Lukas Hostmaelingen’s defending champions from Norway go in as favourites skipped by a man who has also claimed gold at the Youth Olympic and World University Games having just seen off the highly experienced Teams Ramsfjell and Walstad to win the senior Norwegian Championships, while last year’s beaten finalists Italy and third place play-off winners Denmark are also packed with quality.
Team Carson were meanwhile disappointed with their performance in Finland after their then 17-year-old skip and his three 15-year-old teammates had put in a stunning performance to win bronze the previous year, but valuable lessons have been taken from that experience.
“Obviously we were disappointed that we came sixth last year, but I think it has probably been a beneficial thing for us and as a team it was probably the reality check that we needed and hopefully we can bounce back this year and come back with a medal this time,” said Carson.
They, too, have now enjoyed success playing at senior level, notably matching Germany’s European champions Team Muskatewitz at last month’s Aberdeen International, where World number five ranked compatriots Team Whyte were beaten in the quarter-finals and World number one and newly crowned men’s World champions Team Mouat did not even make the play-offs.
That was an event which also helped integrate destiny’s child MacDonald, the son of 2002 Olympic champion Fiona MacDonald and three time World champion Ewan MacDonald, into their group.
“We have had a great 2025 and another strong event up in Aberdeen and I think that was the best preparation that we could have had going into a World Juniors,” said Carson. 
“We managed to integrate Jake into our team that weekend as well and he got a game under his belt and that could be a massive help this week.”
The Scots open their campaign in the 10 team event by meeting the USA and also take on Korea and they are looking to draw inspiration from the opportunity of playing in the soon-to-be Olympic venue.
“We have visited the arena and it looks incredible and everything just looks so good and we knew that coming into this week but just seeing it in person was a different experience altogether,” said Carson.
“Hopefully we can use that atmosphere that the crowd can create to go out there and do our job.”
The World Junior Curling Championships runs from 12-21 April.
Watch streamed games on The Curling Channel.
Team Scotland
Orrin Carson
Logan Carson
Archie Hyslop
Charlie Gibb
Jake MacDonald
Scotland Schedule: 
Sunday 13 April
Session 2
Scotland – USA
Session 3
Scotland – Korea
Monday 14 April
Session 4
Scotland – Norway
Tuesday 15 April
Session 6
Scotland – Denmark
Wednesday 16 April
Session 7
Scotland – Italy
Thursday 17 April
Session 8
Scotland – Japan
Friday 18 April
Session 10
Scotland – Canada
Saturday 19 April
Session 12
Scotland – Germany
Sunday 20 April
Semi finals
Monday 21 April
Final and bronze medal game
