Jeff Stoughton is headed back to the Brier, and Mike McEwen is, once again, pondering what might have been.
Stoughton jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first end, lead 5-1 after four and cruised to an 8-3 victory over McEwen in the final of the Safeway Championship on Sunday.
"It turned around quick because we actually had the advantage," said McEwen of the first end, "I thought we jumped on them pretty good, had a good handle on the ice and one rock deep and things kind of turned quickly. We didn’t have much room for error on the last couple and Jeff made us pay."
Stoughton went undefeated during the Provincial Men’s Curling Championship, with he and his team of Jon Mead, Reid Carruthers and Mark Nichols headed to the Tim Hortons Brier in Kamloops from March 1-9.
It was a good bounce-back for Stoughton after a somewhat disappointing performance at the Roar of the Rings Canadian Curling Trials in Winnipeg in December.
"You can always over-analyse when you don’t win things, and I think we were a little bit too uptight going into Winnipeg and we need to be a little more excited about it and not so much worried about how our preparation is and that," said Stoughton, "The last month has been a great fun month of curling, and we brought that to this event and made sure we enjoyed it, and we’re going to take it to Kamloops as well."
Meanwhile, it’s the fourth time in the last five years McEwen has lost in the final of the Provincial Men’s Curling Championship as he continues to look for his first trip to the Brier.
"I don’t know if they get hard, it gets more aggravating," said McEwen, "They’re a great team. I’m not going to take anything away from how they played but we’re a great team too. I think we deserve to be on the national level but we’ve got a giant to go through in Manitoba."
Greg Balsdon was the giant-killer in Ontario, defeating eight-time defending provincial champion Glenn Howard in the final to earn his first trip to the Brier.
Steve Laycock won the Saskatchewan title for the second straight year while Brad Gushue took home the crown in Newfoundland and Labrador and Jean-Michel Ménard won the Quebec title.
The final seven berths in the 12-team field will be decided February 9th with the conclusion of playdowns in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island, Northern Ontario, Alberta, Yukon/Northwest Territories and British Columbia.
In other notes from the weekend at the MTS IcePlex…
– attendance for the five days of the Safeway Championship was 4,866, a disappointing turnout for the first Provincial Men’s Curling Championship in Winnipeg in nearly 20 years.
– on Friday night, Brandon was officially awarded the 2015 Safeway Championship. It’ll take place from February 4th to 8th at Westman Communications Group Place.
– the all-stars were presented on Saturday, with Brandon’s Steve Irwin being named the all-star skip. He was joined by lead Tyler Forrest from Team Lyburn, second Matt Wozniak from Team McEwen and third Jon Mead from Team Stoughton.
– Brandon’s Allan Lyburn, Rob Fowler’s third, and Neepawa’s Kelly Robertson were honoured as co-winners of the Pat Spiring award at the Safeway Championship.