ST. JOHN'S, N.L. — Whatever it means, the Brad Gushue factor doesn’t seemed to have impacted participation in the Newfoundland and Labrador Tankard provincial men’s curling championship, at least as much as it did in years past.
The 2020 Tankard begins today at the Re/Max Centre (St. John’s Curling Club), where Gushue’s rink is one of nine entered.
It’s the first appearance at the Tankard for Gushue, Mark Nichols, Brett Gallant and Geoff Walker since 2017. The previous two years, as defending Canadian men’s champions, they didn’t need to take part in provincial playdowns in order to participate in the Brier, since they had an automatic berth as Team Canada.
That changed last year, when Gushue lost in the Brier semifinal.
So he’s back in the Tankard, which he has won 14 times in the previous 17 years, the only gaps coming those past two years, and in 2006, when he wasn’t available because he and Nichols and then teammates Russ Howard, Jamie Korab and Mike Adam were busy winning a gold medal for Canada at the Torino Olympics.
That record of success definitely kept others away from the Tankard. Except for 2013, when there were eight rinks entered, no more than six teams took part from 2011 to 2017.
In 2015, when the Tankard was in Labrador City, only two teams played, Gushue’s and Gary Wensman’s from the host club. Nobody else wanted to pay what would have been the considerable travel expenses just to take a longshot at knocking off the perennial provincial champ.
With Gushue out of the provincial picture, the numbers went up; there were an even dozen competing in the 2019 Tankard, won by Andrew Symonds of St. John’s. And while the entries are down compared to last year, the nine teams which take to the ice this week are as many as took part in 2018, the first year of Gushue’s absence as Team Canada.
It might have been 10 entries this year had the timing been different for the reigning provincial junior men’s champions.
Dennis Bruce, coach of that team and father of its skip, Daniel Bruce, said they probably would have been in the Tankard had they not been representing Newfoundland and Labrador at the Canadian junior championships, which concluded in Langley, B.C., on Sunday.
Another factor compromising the Bruce rink’s potential entry into the Tankard was the timing of the 2020 world junior event, beginning in just over two weeks in Siberian region of Russia. If Bruce and his rinkmates had won the Canadians — which they nearly did, losing 8-6 to a Manitoba team in Sunday’s final — it would have been difficult flying cross-country to St. John's, putting in a grinding week of competition at the Tankard, then getting prepared to travel halfway around the world for another tough event.
[email protected]
Twitter: @telybrendan
