Brad Gushue’s dream of a third Olympic Winter Games came to a horrific end Wednesday night at Scotiabank Centre.
It appeared Gushue was initially handed a gift by opposing skip Brad Jacobs. Up 5-3 on Gushue, the 2014 Olympic champion missed his last shot of the 10th end, coming too deep into the house to set up a triple takeout for Gushue – the 2006 Olympic gold medallist – to score three for the win.
A victory would have qualified Gushue for the playoffs, propelling his squad into Friday’s semifinal, thus eliminating Winnipeg’s suddenly struggling Matt Dunstone.
However, Gushue missed the triple – driving Jacobs’ last stone through a port, missing the other two stones – and Jacobs had the 6-3 win.
Gushue held his head in his hands on the ice, seemingly in disbelief at his miss.
TSNGushue had earlier suffered a morning loss to Regina’s Mike McEwen. The twin Wednesday losses eliminated the defending men’s Trials champion (4-3) from the ninth edition of the Canadian Olympic Trials.
Jacobs had already clinched first place in the round robin after the morning draw. His crew will face the winner of Friday’s semifinal battle between McEwen (5-2) and Dunstone (4-3) on Saturday, in the first match of a best-of-three final series.
Dunstone was pasted 9-5 by McEwen on Wednesday night for a third straight loss, and will need to regroup for the semifinal.
In other matches, Saskatoon’s Rylan Kleiter (2-5) defeated Calgary’s Kevin Koe 8-3 (4-5) and John Epping of Sudbury, Ont. (3-4) edged youthful Jordon McDonald of Winnipeg (1-6) by an 8-6 scoreline.
Team Gushue, in the midst of a farewell tour for their soon-to-retire skip, have two Grand Slam events on the horizon – in mid-December and mid-January – before a hometown Brier in St. John’s, beginning in March.
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