Gushue hopes to sweep aside Brier curse
No skip has ever won Olympic, world and world junior gold medals. Brad Gushue could become the first this week at the Edmonton Ford World Men’s Curling Championship.
But history suggests it could be a challenge. Since Glenn Howard won the worlds in Edmonton in 2007, the event has been held in Canada on four occasions and a Canadian team has managed to win only one of them.
And maybe you noticed that before Kevin Koe won the worlds last year in Basel, Switzerland, Canada had failed to find gold at three in a row — which is nothing compared to the nine-year drought Rachel Homan ended at the world women’s championship last weekend in Beijing.
You should also know, as the world championships begin Saturday at the Northlands Coliseum, that first-time Brier winners have had their problems.
You can put Randy Ferbey in that category. Twice.
Throwing third rocks for Pat Ryan in 1988, Edmonton’s Ferbey and teammates Ryan, Don Walchuk and Don McKenzie lost in the final against Eigil Ramsfjell of Norway. They bounced back to win it the next year.
Ferbey took his own team of David Nedohin, Scott Pfeifer and Marcel Rocque to Lausanne, Switzerland, in 2001 and didn’t even return home with a medal after winning the Brier. The Ferbey Four returned to the worlds three more times and won them all.
Edmonton’s Kevin Martin won an Olympic gold medal but he was no world-beater after winning his first Brier in 1991, losing to Scotland’s David Smith in the final.
There’s a long list of Team Canada skips who entered the worlds as favourites and failed to win. Is there a Brier letdown factor for first-time Canadian teams?
“Any other team in that position would for sure be vulnerable,” Niklas Edin of Sweden said. “But Team Gushue has been the team to beat for a couple of years now and seems to be stronger than ever. They will be the team to beat in my opinion. But we’ll, uh, try to do something about that.”
Rocque, who is here coaching China, believes there is a challenge there for the Gushue crew.
“The worlds can be anticlimactic after a team wins the Brier, especially if it’s the first worlds. Absolutely,” Rocque said.
But Scotland’s David Murdoch agrees Gushue is an exceptional case.
“There is no question how much that Brier meant to Brad and the guys. But Brad and Mark Nichols have experience of something very similar with the Olympics in 2006 so I don’t see it being a problem for them to get back up for the challenge.”