Pat Simmons of Canada and Thomas Ulsrud of Norway finished off their round-robin play at the Ford World Men’s Curling Championship with their 10th wins Thursday and immediately set about planning for their rematch in Friday’s Page 1-2 playoff game.
Team Canada’s Nolan Thiessen and Carter Rycroft show their intensity on Thursday. (Photo, Curling Canada/Michael Burns)
Simmons used his last rock to pick out Italy’s counter and score a single for a 7-6 win over the Joel Retornaz team, while Ulsrud jumped into an early lead to beat Marc Pfister of Switzerland 6-4.
“That was a good way to finish, to have a game where Pat has to make his last one,” said Canadian third John Morris. “Those are always nice to have, a bit of pressure going into the playoffs. A good character win, good to finish off with a win and we can build on that going into the playoffs.”
Against Norway, which beat Canada 9-3 in the round-robin, Morris said he, Simmons, second Carter Rycroft, lead Nolan Thiessen, alternate Tom Sallows and coaches Earle Morris and Rick Lang have to be prepared for battle.
“We have to be sharper all up and down. We seemed dull and flat and they took it to so we have to make sure we match their intensity. We’re going to have a good set of rocks for the playoffs. We expect a better battle then we gave them the first game.”
Norway and Canada finished atop the standings with 10-1 records but because they beat Canada Norway gets to choose between hammer or rocks and Ulsrud said they will take the hammer.
“I was surprised we’re 10-1 but hey, we have two shots to go to the final and both with hammer so that’s good,” said Ulsrud. “I was a little anxious going into the week. We practised a lot but not a lot of games so I was afraid we would be rusty and we were at the beginning. But now it is picking up so it looks good.”
Niklas Edin of Sweden, the 2013 world champion, guaranteed himself a playoff spot with a 7-6 win over Jialiang Zang of China and John Shuster kept alive the U.S. hopes with a 6-5, extra-end win over Evgeny Arkhipov of Russia.
Edin, third Oscar Eriksson, second Kristian Lindström, lead Christoffer Sundgren, alternate Henrik Leek and coach Fredrik Lindberg had a difficult time with China until the seventh end. Two half misses by Zang allowed Edin to set up the house for a routine hit and stick with his final stone to score three for a 7-3 lead. But China got two back in the eighth and stole one in nine and forced Edin to make a routine hit-and-stick with final rock to win.
Norway’s Christoffer Svae takes a break. (Photo, Curling Canada/Michael Burns)
“I didn’t have my best day of work today but there’s still one more game to come and we’ll try to find the playoff form,” said Edin who will finish his round-robin against Scotland in the evening draw.
“Tonight is really important, especially for me. I want to play well and really see what we can do in trying to set up angles and stuff because we’re going to need that in the playoffs.”
Aku Kauste of Finland scored threes in the second and eight ends in the final round robin draw on Thursday to beat Joel Retornaz of Italy 7-5 and advance into Friday’s 2:30 p.m. (all times Atlantic) tiebreaker game against John Shuster of the U.S. at the 2015 Ford World Men’s Curling Championship.
Kauste, third Kasper Hakunti, second Pauli Jäämies, lead Janne Pitko, alternate Leo Mäkelä and coach Tomi Rantamaki finished the round-robin at 6-5, tied with the U.S., who had beaten Evgeny Arkhipov of Russia 6-5 in an extra end earlier in the day.
Click for story on the final round robin draw
All Canadian games and the playoff rounds for the 2015 Ford World Men’s Curling Championship will be televised on TSN/RDS2, the official broadcasting partner of the Season of Champions. The full broadcast schedule is available at http://www.tsn.ca/2014-15-tsn-curling-broadcast-schedule-1.95515.
Live scoring is available at: http://www.curling.ca/scoreboard/#/competitions/1670-2015-ford-world-men-s-curling-championship/scoreboard
To purchase tickets to the 2015 Ford World Men’s Curling Championship, go to: http://www.curling.ca/2015worldmen-en/tickets/