Sault Ste. Marie’s Brad Jacobs and team from the Community First Curling Centre will have an extra event to attend in early March.
The Jacobs rink, which includes third Ryan Fry, second E.J. Harnden and lead Ryan Harnden, will be off to St. John’s, Nfld for the 2017 Tim Hortons Brier, which opens on Mar. 4.
Team Jacobs will represent northern Ontario after beating Dylan Johnston of the Fort William Curling Club in Thunder Bay 6-3 on Sunday afternoon in Thunder Bay at the 2017 Travellers Men’s Provincials, hosted by the Fort William Curling Club.
After blanking the opening end, Jacobs would score a pair in the second end to take the early lead. The Jacobs rink would add to the lead after a steal of one in the fourth. Johnston would get on the board with a single in the fifth. The teams would trade deuces in the seventh and eighth ends before Jacobs sealed the win with a single in the ninth before running Johnston out of rocks in the final end.
“It feels great. For our team, anytime we get into this event and we can win it, it’s just a total relief,” Jacobs told TBNewsWatch.
“We know that we’re the team that should come out and win this thing, but you still have to go out and prove it against a bunch of great curlers and great teams. I’m really just proud of the team, my guys, for hanging in there all week and playing the way they did and winning this thing.”
A disappointed Johnston said that the early ends were a struggle for the Thunder Bay rink.
“Our team didn’t play anywhere close to where we had to play for the first five ends,” Johnston said. “I’m surprised we stuck around. They were laying tons of rocks each and every end,”
Team Jacobs, who will open the Brier against British Columbia in the opening draw, went unbeaten in the five-day event after posting a 7-0 record through round robin action, earning a spot directly in the final.
Jacobs would say that winning in northern Ontario is “never easy.”
“You can never take a break or any time off mentally when you’re playing in a big game like that,” Jacobs said. “You just have to go out there and play it one shot at a time and hopefully you make everything.”
“We’re not naïve in the talent that we have in northern Ontario,” E.J. Harnden added. “We know that some of these teams are great teams. They don’t tour as much as we do, but if they did, they would be as competitive as we are. We never take this event lightly.
“And there’s always that added pressure for us,” Harnden also said. “We’ve always said this is probably the hardest game we play all year, the provincial final game. We know the talent and we know what the pressure is like.”
Johnston, who finished second in the round robin with a 5-2 record, advanced to the final thanks to an 8-7 win over Chris Glibota of the Copper Cliff Curling Club, a Sault Ste. Marie native.
Other teams who have clinched spots in the Brier include Team Koe, skipped by Kevin Koe, who will play in the event as Team Canada; Team Casey, skipped by Adam Casey, will represent Saskatchewan, Team Howard, skipped by Glenn Howard, will represent Ontario, Team Menard, skipped by Jean-Michel Menard, will represent Quebec; Team Murphy, skipped by Jamie Murphy, will represent Nova Scotia, Team MacKenzie, skipped by Eddie MacKenzie, will represent Prince Edward Island; Team Gushue, skipped by Brad Gushue, will represent Newfoundland/Labrador; Team Koe, skipped by Jamie Koe, will represent the Northwest Territories; Team Kochan, skipped by Craig Kochan, will represent Yukon; and Team Nix, skipped by Jim Nix, will represent Nunavut.
With files from Leith Dunick, TBNewsWatch
