News National

OSHAWA, Ont. — Winnipeg’s Reid Carruthers will play in his first Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling final as a skip taking on Brad Gushue of St. John’s, N.L., for the National men’s championship.

Carruther defeated Glenn Howard of Penetanguishene, Ont., 5-2 and Gushue eliminated Toronto’s John Epping 8-6 during Saturday’s semifinals at General Motors Centre.

Since leaving Jeff Stoughton’s team forming his own squad last season, Carruthers has qualified for the playoffs in five Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling events but couldn’t get past the barrier in the quarterfinals. 

“I’m not going to lie, this is the first final I’ve been in as a skip on the Grand Slam series so I’m pretty excited,” said Carruthers, who won the 2013 National with Team Stoughton.

Carruthers faced Brad Jacobs of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., earlier Saturday in the quarterfinals and took down the reigning Olympic gold medallist 7-5. 

“Obviously it was on our minds because since we started curling together, in the Grand Slams we had been to five quarterfinals and not made it past that point,” Carruthers said. “So this morning we’re playing the Olympic champs and you’re thinking to yourself, ‘we’re the underdogs here but hopefully if you play well, you can beat them.’ It worked out today.” 

Carruthers opened the semifinal match against Howard with the hammer but was forced to a draw for just a single in the second. He extended his lead to 3-0 in the third when Howard came up light and gave up a steal of two. Howard, who has won 14 Grand Slam titles as a skip, struggled again clipping a guard with his last in the fourth and having to settle for a single. The teams alternated singles in six and seven as Howard was unable to mount a comeback.

Meanwhile, Gushue took two in the first and stole one in the second for a 3-0 lead until Epping went ahead with an amazing shot to score four in the third. 

Gushue could only get a single in the fourth end to tie it but got lucky breaks in the next couple ends stealing one in the fifth and three in the sixth. Epping counted two in seven but ran out of rocks in eight. 

It’s the second Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling final this season for Gushue, who finished runner-up to Calgary’s Kevin Koe in the season-opening Tour Challenge.

“It’s great we’re in a Grand Slam final,” said Team Gushue third Mark Nichols. “The second one this year and hopefully we’ll be on the other side of it tomorrow afternoon but we’re going to have to play a little bit better than we did tonight.” 

Gushue is a three-time Grand Slam champion and won his first at the National in 2010. Nichols also captured the National in 2013 — coincidentally, while playing front-end with Carruthers on Team Stoughton — before rejoining Gushue last season. 

“We’re going to have to play well,” Nichols said. “They seem to be curling really well and they’re confident. We’ve been playing well this week too so I expect a good back-and-forth game and hopefully, we’ll have hammer coming home in the last end.”

Carruthers also shared what it’ll take to win and jokingly trash-talked his former teammate. 

“They’re one of the best teams in the world,” Carruthers said adding with a smile, “We’re playing well so it should be a really good game but hopefully I can get him off his game, throw some jabs here and get in his head a little bit but it’ll be tough. He’s a pretty mentally strong guy.” 

The National is the third stop — and second major — of the 2015-16 Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling season and runs through to Sunday evening at the General Motors Centre. Previously a men’s invitational, the National expanded this year to include a women’s division for the first time in the event’s history. 

Tracy Fleury of Sudbury, Ont., faces Ottawa’s Rachel Homan for the inaugural women’s National title. Watch at 4 p.m. ET / 1 p.m. PT Sunday on Sportsnet.