Koe rink on cusp of elimination
Kevin Martin’s final rock scored two for dramatic 6-5 win and 3-0 record
Few would have picked the Kevin Koe rink to be the first team all but eliminated from the Roar Of The Rings, but his former friendly rival at Edmonton’s Saville Sports Centre may have inflicted the mortal wound Tuesday morning.
Kevin Martin’s double takeout to score two with his last rock in the 10th end produced a dramatic 6-5 win and dropped Koe — the 2010 Brier and world champion — to 0-3 in the Olympic curling trials at MTS Centre.
The third loss doesn’t put Koe mathematically out of the eightteam round robin, but it’s close. Only three teams make the playoffs.
While Martin, the reigning Olympic champion, raised his record to 3-0 — tied with Brier champion Brad Jacobs of Sault Ste. Marie atop the standings — Koe described his plight on his Twitter account as: “Frustrating . painful . not how we envisioned this week.”
The 38-year-old who plays out of Calgary’s Glencoe Club left the arena without speaking to the media after Martin rescued his teammates from the fire with his last-rock heroics.
“Koe had two losses and they played like (they were desperate),” said Martin, who looked to be in deep trouble when Koe scored two in the fifth for a 4-1 lead. “Kevin played brilliantly. Probably should have had us. He just slipped a little deep on the draw in the eighth, where we stole two. Other than that, they won the game. They played better than us.”
In the clutch, though, Koe threw an imperfect guard with his first stone in the 10th, and his last rock left the possibility of a double.
“If Koe makes a good guard with his first one, we’re drawing with the in-turn, not playing any hits, and still trying to generate a deuce with the draws,” said Martin’s third, Dave Nedohin.
“But obviously when the hits are there, Kevin’s throwing them so good right now, you’ve got to let him throw them.
“That’s one of those games that we snuck away with that we probably shouldn’t have, but we hung in there. And that’s what you do.”
Jacobs, the reigning Brier champion, has been a force in these trials, as well, and his 6-5 win over Glenn Howard left the Penetanguishene, Ont., team with a precarious 1-2 record.
“We have felt pretty relaxed all week. At 3-0, it’s a beauty start,” said Jacobs.
“It’s a long week ahead and we have to keep it going.”
“There’s no easy games,” said Howard. “Every game out there this morning came down to the last shot, and that’s what you expect from this field.”
“The best part is that whoever ends up winning, it’s no different the next step (at the Olympics),” said Martin, who was to meet Howard in Tuesday’s evening draw. “It’s the same pressure, day after day after day. Whoever does come out of this will be ready.
“Now we play Glenn tonight, and he’s got two losses, so he’ll play like Koe did, and it’ll be another dogfight.”
In the other morning games, Winnipeg’s Jeff Stoughton avoided going 0-3 by edging Toronto’s John Epping 4-3, and the other local rink, skipped by Mike McEwen, handed John Morris’s Kelowna, B.C. team its first loss, 7-5.
Howard, Stoughton, McEwen and Epping were all 1-2 heading into the evening’s play.
‘That’s one of those games that we snuck away with that we probably shouldn’t have, but we hung in there. And that’s what you do.’
DAVE NEDOHIN
Third on Kevin Martin’s rink