(by Jonathan Brazeau) Click to read at Grand Slam website.
TORONTO — Team Gushue seemed to be channelling the Toronto Blue Jays this weekend.
Much like the Blue Jays in the ALDS, the St. John’s team completed a perfect sweep, posting an unblemished 6-0 record to capture the Stu Sells Toronto Tankard.
With their leader Brad Gushue out indefinitely, vice Mark Nichols skipped the team to a 5-4 victory over hometown hero John Epping in Monday night’s sharpshooting final.
Second Brett Gallant said Toronto has been good to the team lately as they also went undefeated here to win the Players’ Championship in April.
“We like playing here and we enjoy the city,” Gallant said with a smile. “We really enjoy getting around to the Blue Jays games and just being in the same city was fun. Yeah we love it here.”
Team Gushue (Grand Slam photo from Instagram)
Gushue missed his fourth consecutive event to start the season due to a lingering hip injury. The 2006 Olympic gold medallist was in town to support the team before heading to the Rogers Centre on Sunday night for the Blue Jays’ epic Game 3 victory to sweep the Texas Rangers.
Nichols, who normally throws third stones, has moved up to skip in the interim with Adam Spencer, Charley Thomas and Pat Simmons filling in at vice over the course of their previous three events. Spencer was back in the mix this week with Gallant and lead Geoff Walker staying put in their front-end roles.
Gallant said it has definitely been a challenge playing without their superstar skip.
“It’s something we’re not used to but we’ve been really fortunate the players we have had filling in — it’s Spencer’s second time filling in, and of course Charley and Pat — they’ve all fit in really well with our team,” Gallant said. “They’ve made it as easy as it could possibly be, I think, without Brad around.”
Despite missing their ace, Team Gushue has qualified for the playoffs at all four events they’ve competed in.
“It’s nice to get a win. We played pretty well the first three events. Mark’s been playing really well throwing the last ones,” Gallant said. “We’ve kind of hit a bit of a rough when we hit the playoffs. We ran into some really good teams playing really well so it’s nice to win one after playing so well.”
After alternating singles in the first two ends, Epping looked to be in trouble with Team Gushue holding a crowded house during the third end. Third Mat Camm bailed them out with a triple takeout and Epping delivered the double to clear the house and force the blank.
Team Gushue capitalized to score a deuce in the fourth end. Epping kissed a counter and Nichols eased his last into the house to take a 3-1 lead at halftime.
Epping made another great shot with his last in the fifth end by tapping Nichols’ shot stone out and just missed one of his own to count two and knot it up again.
Nichols looked for another pair in the sixth end after he hit and rolled buried with his first skip stone. The door was open to draw into the four-foot circle for two, but he came up short by the smallest of margins to only get one.
After Nichols made an amazing in-off double, Epping continued his human highlight reel performance getting a single in the seventh to square it 4-4 coming home.
Nichols didn’t need to throw his last in the final end, however, as he held shot with his first skip rock and Epping was unable to knock it out.
Both teams were actually playing short-handed relying on pinch-hitters. Epping, Camm and lead Tim March were missing second Pat Janssen, who had surgery to repair a fractured zygoma and will be out for a few weeks. Janssen fell face-first onto the ice during a curling clinic the team was conducting over the previous weekend. Scott Hodgson, who plays with Olympic silver medallist Mike Harris, filled in at second.
Meanwhile, Sherry Middaugh of Coldwater, Ont., also posted a perfect record completing a 7-0 run on the women’s side with a 5-3 win over Toronto’s Cathy Auld in the final.