Olympic Curling Trials: Men’s Contenders, Challengers and Underdogs

We’ve come to the end of my four-part Canadian Olympic Trials preview.

Part 1 (don’t miss it) highlighted everything grand and crazy about the Trials, the pinnacle curling event of each quadrennial. It also introduced my women’s Favourite.

Part 2 took fans through the remainder of the women’s field, batched as Contenders, Challengers and Underdogs.

Part 3 started with a wild stat and ended with the Favourites among the men’s field in Halifax.

This final segment finishes up with the men’s Contenders, Challengers and Underdogs.

My analysis uses head-to-head wins and losses, scoring, and winning percentages between the competing teams. Given the many lineup changes among the men’s fours – and realization this event is inherently unpredictable – I’ve tossed out any data before the 2022-23 season.

Bill James’ log5 method and his Pythagorean expectation are used to estimate the expected wins of each team.

Contenders

Team John Epping (+345) has had success since their veteran skip packed his (curling) bags from the lower mainland and trotted north to join the Horgan brothers and Manitoba transplant Ian McMillan.

Epping has a 31-27 record against this field but is 21-15 with this lineup; remove their abysmal 2-7 against Dunstone and Team Epping is 19-8 (70%) against the rest of the field.

Given the results, you could argue this team could be in the Favourites category. John hasn’t won a Grand Slam in seven years, and it’s been six since he made a final, but this team narrowly missed a Brier playoff at 6-2 and has shown they can beat anyone in this event.

Maybe a buffalo (Ian) combined with two moose (Jacob and Tanner) is the magic formula for John Epping to add his name to the list of Trials winners without a Brier title.

Predicted Wins = 4.3

Team Mike McEwen (+1050) has been consistent so far this season – three Grand Slam events played, each with a 2-2 record. In the first two, it left them out of the playoffs but a tiebreaker win in Tahoe against Joel Retornaz put them into the quarterfinals, where they were quickly dispatched 8-4 by eventual champion Bruce Mouat.

Current form may be a concern, but McEwen has shown the ability to raise his own game and team to the highest level required – twice before on the biggest stage. He was the First All-Star skip at the 2024 Brier and nearly led a comeback against a Gushue team in the final game. Eight years ago, at the Olympic Trials in Ottawa, Mike curled 95% in the final only to lose a heartbreaker to Kevin Koe.

If Mike is at his best – one wonders about his recovery from off-season knee surgery – this team could be in the mix. McEwen may hope to meet Gushue (8-5) or Epping (5-2) in the final, instead of Dunstone and Jacobs whom he is a combined 4-15 against.

Predicted Wins = 4.3

Team Brad Gushue (+1050) now holds a ranking that has dropped to 18th in the world.

Oddsmakers are not impressed so far with one quarterfinal appearance in the Tour Challenge and the choice of an overseas trip to Switzerland rather than Lake Tahoe for the last Grand Slam. They did qualify in Switzerland but lost 10-5 to Wouter Gosgens from the Netherlands, surrendering two four-enders in the game.

They are 28-21 against the field since their bronze medal in Beijing. Brad is 16-5 against Koe and Dunstone, leaving him only 12-16 against everyone else.

He might not be the favourite, but this is still Brad Gushue, six-time Brier champion and defending Trials champion. The skip has announced his retirement, just as a few others from this field may do before 2029’s 10th Canadian Olympic Trials.

This event reminds me of 2013 when everyone knew it could be the last hurrah for the big three of Kevin Martin, Jeff Stoughton and Glenn Howard. Gushue could falter like the latter two and miss the playoffs or make a K-Mart charge to the weekend.

Predicted Wins = 4.9

Challengers

Team Kevin Koe (+12500) has a skip at the end of his career looking for one last magical week.

Koe, the 2017 champion, has shown an incredible ability to reach higher levels. He has won nearly as many of the 10-end events (four Briers and one Trials) as the eight-end Grand Slams (six).

His last Grand Slam title was a thrilling 5-4 victory at the 2023 Players Championship, scoring three in the final end against Yannick Schwaller.

Team Koe has struggled this season, with one event of note, a finals appearance in the Tier 2 Grand Slam where they lost to eventual U.S. Olympic Trials champion Daniel Casper. Koe is 18-26 against this field but remove Gushue and he’s a more palatable 16-18.

Kevin can’t escape Father Time but maybe he can put him off for one more week and give us a thrill.

Predicted Wins = 3.3

Team Jordon McDonald (+10000) is a young team from Manitoba that won the Pre-Trials spot and have reached the big stage for the first time.

McDonald may not impress us with pajama pants and four-second runbacks – like Jason Gunnlaugson in 2009 – but he might play spoiler with the advantage of weightless expectations.

Team McDonald have played only 20 games against this field, so the projected wins total is likely below three. They are 2-1 against Dunstone, both coming in the last two PointsBet Invitationals. Five wins against Kleiter to two loses is fine, but it makes their record against the teams above them (5-8) less than encouraging.

In total, their ages add up to 92, only 57.5% of Team Jacobs.

Predicted Wins = 4.2

Underdogs

Team Rylan Kleiter (+20000) are fighters. They fought hard to reach a Trials spot after a breakout season in 2024-25, where they reached their first Brier and gained valuable Grand Slam experience.

They have gathered more Slam experience this fall but most of it has been in defeat, with only one win and one shoot-out victory in 12 Slam games.

They are 9-33 against this field including zero wins against Jacobs, Epping and McEwen and Kleiter will need to score more than 4.21 points per game to have a chance to be in the mix… or it will be another week of gathering experience.