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By Ben Hoppe, U.S. curling writer

When the four men’s teams at the U.S. Olympic Team Trials took the ice in Sioux Falls, S.D., the team that had spent more years together as a full team was not who many would have thought. It was not the favourites and five-time Olympic Trials champions, Team Shuster. It was not the reigning national champions, Team Dropkin. It was not the eventual Olympic representatives, Team Casper.

The team that had all members together the longest was the junior team, whose oldest members were just 20 years old.

In a time when rinks rarely stick together for more than a few years, Team Hebert has been together for the better part of seven years. To make their situation even more unique, they all hail from Wisconsin’s Eau Claire Curling Club.

As so often happens, the idea for Team Hebert began when another team failed, and it started with their coach, 1998 Olympian Mike “Pep” Peplinski. In his first year of coaching curling, he was coaching a Wisconsin team with one player from Eau Claire and other players from around the state. His ask for any players was to make a three-year commitment, but those commitments fell through, and the team dissolved in two years. So Peplinski decided to re-evaluate.

"In my mind, I didn't like trying to coordinate with players from all over the state," Peplinski said. "So, I decided at that point to try and create a team."

Creating a team with athletes who were willing to commit to his vision was the tough part because, in Wisconsin, winter sports are dominated by basketball and hockey.

"I remember wanting 'athletes,' but not winter sports athletes as I didn’t want to compete with hockey and basketball," he said.

Peplinski started with a fellow teacher and curler, Brian Paral, who ran the junior curling program in Eau Claire. Peplinski shared his vision of a competitive junior team, all from their club. Brian's son, Benji Paral, was a clear choice for their first member of the team. Also in the junior program was Caden Hebert, who was willing to commit to the team even though he was three years older than Benji. The team was halfway there.

In trying to find more possibilities, the coach went to his most trusted confidant: his wife, Michelle. Also a teacher as well as a high school basketball coach, Peplinski was well familiar with her ability to identify good athletes with a strong work ethic. She identified Jack Wendtland and CJ Peca and convinced them to join Eau Claire’s juniors program, but Peplinski knew that change is often inevitable and not everyone may be interested in sticking with it.

Just a week after their team of four agreed to form, the coach got a phone call from a father whose son played baseball with Hebert. The two fathers and two sons were also playing in Eau Claire’s rookie league together, so it was a natural fit for Jackson Bestland to be added to the team.

Just like that, Team Hebert was formed.

Bestland can still recall details of their first practice.

“The [Green Bay] Packers were playing, so it was practice and watching the game," he said.

Even though the 20-year-old vice was the lone non-Packers fan, he observed that everyone just clicked immediately.

Although Peca left the team after the first year, it didn’t take long for the remaining four to take big strides in quick fashion. Having a coach with Peplinski’s pedigree certainly helped, but what has made him so effective is his ability to communicate with his players.

“He’s a fourth-grade teacher,” Bestland observed. “He knows how to get the message across so well.”

But Peplinski didn’t do it alone.

“Michelle not only helped with bringing Jack on board, but she's been a great sounding board for me," he said.

Her guidance helped Peplinski navigate walking parents through the journey of competitive curling, identify the best practice and event schedule for a young junior team, and build a team atmosphere.

LEARNING BY LOSING

There is no debating that this team has already shared a lot of success together, but the road to success is rarely linear. Bestland attributes the successes they’ve shared to the losses they’ve endured together.

"I think losing with each other makes you want to win with each other all the more," reflected the vice-skip.

Bestland pointed to the team’s first trip to the U18 national championship, where Team Hebert struggled, notching two wins and two losses. They showed the lessons they learned in that first year by going 14-0 in their next two trips to the same event to take home consecutive U18 championships in 2023 and 2024.

Even during this winning streak, the team was still humbled again. In the two years they won the U18 championship, they went on to lose the finals of the U21 national championships in each of those seasons. With every jump up, the team has endured challenging losses along the way.

"If we want to get to where we want to get as a team, we have to go through some growing pains," Peplinski said.

The team wasn’t shocked to encounter more growing pains this season when they won the pre-trials, joining familiar names like John Shuster, Korey Dropkin, and Danny Casper at November’s U.S. Olympic Team Trials in Sioux Falls. Despite a challenging start, the Hebert rink took Shuster to an extra end in their penultimate game of the round robin and took Casper a full 10 ends in their final draw.

The experience will likely prove to be invaluable to them and set them on a good trajectory for the 2030 Winter Games, should the team continue to stick together.

BUILDING AND MAINTAINING CHEMISTRY

To help them navigate the growing pains they will encounter on the ice, the team is backed by the type of chemistry that comes as a result of playing together for one-third of their lives. As they showed in their final games in Sioux Falls, Team Hebert is a team of competitors.

The competitive nature isn’t just saved for the pebbled ice, though.

"We all do things together off the ice — different sports, activities, whatever it is, you know, golf, rock climbing," shared Bestland. "We can bring any sort of card game or board game. We're never really bored with each other."

After a brief pause, Bestland added, "I’m obviously the best," generating a chuckle from his coach.

"Ask any of them, they’re all the best," Peplinski said.

So how does their competitive nature ultimately build chemistry and allow the group of young men to continue taking strides forward? Their coach had one word: trust.

Peplinski noted the team had learned early on that they needed to trust Hebert with his strategic decisions and throwing the last rock. They had to trust each other to maintain composure to follow a missed shot with a made shot. They had to trust that their teammate would pick them up every time.

"We know at the highest level, we can't even string half-misses together," Peplinski noted. "They trust one another, and they just continue to push one another to higher levels."

Their longtime coach has seen his role shift. Where he once was doing everything for the team, they’re advancing to the point where he has seen his role change. Now, Peplinski has shifted his attention to maintaining the positive vibes and keeping the team mentally focused.

To complement Peplinski and help them take the next step with their communication and chemistry, Team Hebert brought in world champion and two-time Olympian Ann Swisshelm. Peplinski noted Swisshelm has been able to catch things that he might have overlooked, having been with the team so long, and she has also provided valuable insights to Paral and Wendtland at the front end to help them sharpen their skills.

Bestland noted how much of an impact Swisshelm has made across the board.

"She pushes us to be perfect," he said.

Her vision of who the team should model themselves after shows what she knows they’re capable of.

"She always uses Team Mouat as the example," Bestland said.

In addition to noting some similarities in the teams’ upbringings, Mouat serves as the gold standard for communication.

"Their communication style is very similar to ours, just fine-tuned," Bestland said.

The results have borne out their efforts. Team Hebert started the season qualifying for the playoffs in every event they played, including winning the St. Paul Cashspiel, a field including both Casper and Shuster.

While they cooled off, missing playoffs at the Jr. GSOC U25 event and Olympic Trials, the team bounced back again. Hebert qualified for the playoffs at the DEKALB Superspiel and then put on a dominant show in Lohja, Finland, at the World Junior B Curling Championships.

They punched their ticket to the spring’s World Junior Curling Championships as emphatically as they could have. They went undefeated, never having to play a full eight ends throughout the entire event in Finland.

Coach Peplinski was thrilled with what he saw.

"We certainly felt like we were good enough to qualify for A's, but to do it in convincing fashion felt really good," he said.

Before the boys from Eau Claire Curling Club put the world on notice, they’d already been on the map for the United States’ best curlers.

Early in September, Team Shuster’s Chris Plys was asked during an interview about young teams to watch for this season. The first team he mentioned? Team Hebert.

"I’m so excited to watch those boys this year," Plys said. "I think they could win world juniors this year. We won it in '08, and I think this year could be the year. Those kids are for real."

It started with a vision by an Olympian. What happens next, however, is up to the four kids who grew up at the same curling club in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

Lead photo courtesy of USA Curling/Emma Wanyek.