The Brad Gushue rink from St. John’s, which includes PEI native Brett Gallant at second stone, won the Stu Sells Oakville Tankard cashspiel this afternoon in Oakville Ontario, defeating the Reid Carruthers rink from Winnipeg in the final, by a 5-3 score. After blanking the first three ends, Gushue picked up a deuce in end four, and kept Carruthers to a single in the fifth end of the eight end contest. Gushue grabbed a 4-1 lead with another pair, in end six. Carruthers responded with a deuce in seven, but the NL rink scored a single in the final end for the win. Linescore at: http://www.curlingzone.com/event.php?eventid=3811&eventtypeid=81&view=Scores&tp=0
Rachel Homan won the women’s side of the event, stealing the last end of the final for a 5-4 victory over Alena Paetz of Zurich Switzerland.
All four of these teams, along with other rinks including PEI’s Adam Casey foursome, and, on the women’s side in Tier 2, the Suzanne Birt rink, now head to Paradise, in Gushue’s home province, for the Grand Slam of Curling’s inaugural “Tour Challenge”, which starts Tuesday evening, and wraps up on Sunday, with the men’s final at 5:30 pm Atlantic.
Website: http://www.thegrandslamofcurling.com/curling/tour-challenge/