Dropkin hyped for Rock League stops in Utica and Kalamazoo

American curler Korey Dropkin is already amped up for Rock League’s second season.

The professional curling league is set to make five stops in 2027, including its U.S. debut, Jan. 28-31, at NBT Bank Arena in Utica, New York. Rock League’s championship round will also take place in the U.S., running April 15-18 at Wings Event Center in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

When Rock League held its inaugural event last April in Toronto, a number of U.S. fans made the trip north of the border to cheer on the American-based Frontier Curling Club.

That played right into the hands of Dropkin, who serves as Frontier’s captain and thrives on the electric atmosphere of a passionate crowd.

“One in every six ticket-purchaser was someone from the U.S., and so now to bring Rock League events into the U.S. is huge for us,” Dropkin said during a media event Tuesday in Utica. “One of the things I love so much is being able to play in front of a home crowd, just the energy, the atmosphere. I'm someone who is an energy type of player where I like to circulate the energy, so if I can feed off of the crowd, giving me energy is going to help me perform that much better and it just makes it that much more exciting. 

“It's huge that we get these U.S. events. It's huge having more family, more fans and supporters come out to support us. It means a lot.”

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Rock League features six franchises with the world’s top men’s and women’s curlers competing in a variety of different disciplines. The inaugural season saw franchises face off in men’s fours, women’s fours and mixed doubles games during each match of the preliminary round and playoffs, plus a day in between of mixed fours games that acted like a “double jeopardy” round. 

Dropkin said it’s that unique camaraderie, being part of a larger team, that he loves the most about Rock League.

“You're not just playing on a team of two or a team of four. You have a team of 10, and you're not just playing on a men's or a women's (team), you've got five males and five females,” Dropkin explained. “Then when you bring things into the mixed discipline, being on the sheet, playing mixed formats, I had so much fun last year getting to sweep alongside Taylor Anderson and being able to help out my team as much as possible in that format. 

“I think there's so much more opportunity and room for growth and being able to expand our sport and really dig deep into those different nuances that we can create a lot of fun and energy type of atmosphere.” 

Both Rock League and the Grand Slam of Curling, which features the top tour teams in the sport, are owned and operated by The Curling Group. Although this will be Rock League’s first foray into the U.S., the Grand Slam of Curling made its American debut last year in Lake Tahoe, Nevada. Dropkin couldn't compete in that event as his men’s club was preparing for the U.S. Olympic Team Trials. 

“It was a little bit of a lost opportunity and unfortunate that we didn't get to play in that home GSOC event in Tahoe, but now that we've got the event in Utica, we've got the last event in Kalamazoo, these are two great homes of curling that are going to have a lot of energy,” Dropkin said. “There's going to be a lot of fans, a lot of supporters, a lot of families that are able to come out and be there to cheer us on, and I think it's gonna be a great environment.

"It's just a nice next step for our sport and our community to get behind, especially this league.”

Rock League’s Utica trip overlaps with USA Curling’s men's and women's national championships, but of the 10 players on Frontier’s roster from last season, only two — Danny Casper and John Shuster — would potentially be affected. The franchise will also be able to call upon super spares from a pool of available players.

It’s a unique challenge Frontier will have to face that week, but one Dropkin is ready to tackle.

“It's a pretty significant hurdle that we're going to have to get over. We're going to have a bunch of missing pieces to our franchise, but every hurdle comes with another fun obstacle, and we're going to find a way to get through it,” Dropkin said. 

“I'm sure we're going to pick up some pretty valuable pieces along the way. There are a lot of talented athletes out there, and a lot of athletes that really want to play in Rock League, so it'll be a fun opportunity to give other athletes the ability to play and step into Frontier Curling Club and help out our franchise.” 

Full-event and weekend ticket passes for all five Rock League stops go on sale Friday.