News National

SAULT STE. MARIE, Ont. — Kevin Koe came through in the clutch for his Calgary-based crew to clinch a spot in the BOOST National playoffs.

Trailing by one to hometown hero Brad Jacobs in the seventh, Koe dropped a gem on the reigning Olympic gold medallist with a pair of angle-raise takeouts to set up a deuce and leapfrog into the lead.

Koe then stole one in eight to hold on for the wild 6-4 victory during Draw 10 action Thursday night at the Essar Centre.

“He made two good beauties in seven; We call that a skip’s deuce,” Team Koe third Marc Kennedy said. “That was a back-and-forth battle, tough ice conditions with quite a few picks but still lots of good shots made and that’s what you expect with those two teams playing against each other. We just got the right shot at the right time in the last end.”

The 2016 Brier and world title winner Koe finished round-robin play at the Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling tournament a day early with a 3-1 record to advance.

“Any time you’re making the playoffs at a Slam you’re playing well,” Kennedy said. “We’re lucky to have tomorrow off and rest up for Saturday. Hopefully, we can come out with a good performance but I think overall we’re playing pretty good and happy to be in the playoffs come Saturday.”

Jacobs, the defending BOOST National champion, fell to 1-2 and must win his remaining preliminary match Friday afternoon against William Lyburn to remain in contention.

The heavyweight tilt lived up to the hype. Koe opened with the hammer but was forced to draw for just one while facing four. Jacobs emerged with a deuce in the second to pull ahead and Koe attempted a tricky raise for three in the third, however, he missed and only counted one to tie it 2-2.

Jacobs looked at three counters with his last in the fourth and made the high-pressure draw from wide out to land on the lid.

Koe made an equally tough draw in the fifth to get his one and knot it up again 3-3. The team thought it was light out of Koe’s hand, but sweepers Brent Laing and Ben Hebert managed to pull the string, avoid clicking the counter and lock onto the back of the button.

Jacobs didn’t quite get the right angle on his raise in six for a bunch but missed it on the right side and managed to pinball and collide with Koe’s counter to get his point.

It almost looked like Koe was setting up a blank in seven to retain the hammer coming home, down by one, but instead rolled the dice with the back-to-back angle raises to take two.

The tense shootout came down to the wire. Koe was running low on time as he added to the cluster with his last, Jacobs aimed for a long runback double but was just off the mark and when the dust settled it was one Koe counter.

“It could have come either way the whole game so we’re fortunate to get a deuce in seven and kind of get control back,” Kennedy said. “We got a couple misses in the last end and hey, that’s all it takes sometimes and we called that the right side of the inch today.”

Team Koe missed the playoffs at the season-opening Tour Challenge Tier 1 in September but has been getting into the groove building towards December’s Canadian Olympic curling trials in Ottawa by reaching the semifinals at last month’s Masters and following that up with a title victory at the Ashley Home Store Curling Classic in Penticton, B.C., the week after.

“We’ve been playing well,” Kennedy said. “We’ve trying to put together good games and good performances. The odd stinker still finds its way in there but in the big picture Team Koe is playing pretty good and we’re trending upwards for Ottawa.”

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Meanwhile, Brad Gushue of St. John’s, N.L., is also playoff-bound extending his Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling winning streak to start the 2017-18 campaign to 17 games.

Gushue, who has won the Tour Challenge Tier 1 and Masters titles this season, got past Greg Balsdon of Kingston, Ont., 7-6 to climb to a 3-0 record with a game in hand.

“It’s great,” Team Gushue second Brett Gallant said. “It doesn’t really matter how pretty they are, at the end of the day you just want to be in the playoffs. Undefeated is not a huge deal, you just need to be in the playoffs and then obviously they all matter. It’s good, it’s where we want to be.”

Gushue grabbed a point to start and the teams went head-to-head alternating three-spots in the second and third frames then singles in four and five. Balsdon got the equalizer in six to make 5-5 and Gushue hit and stuck for a tight two in the seventh to pull back into the lead. Still, Balsdon looked like he had an opportunity for a double takeout and three to win it coming home in eight but just clipped Gushue’s counter from the side and only counted one.

Gallant was pretty perplexed with how his team managed to pull out another victory.

“We had a pretty poor second end to give up a three and from there it was really big to get the three right back the next end,” Gallant said. “Brad made a really nice double to get three after we were a little fortunate where their last rock ended up. Then after that it was just kind of being patient.

“The ice was tricky, the rocks are tricky but we got a chance for two in the seventh, which really helped. Even at that, Greg had a tough tricky shot there and might have been able to score three in the last end. We were fortunate but it’s just tough because the ice is tricky.”

Winnipeg’s Mike McEwen moved up to a 2-1 record following a 7-2 win over Scotland’s Bruce Mouat. The 2016 world junior champion Mouat will play at least another match with a 2-2 record although it’s yet to be determined whether he will go straight through to the quarterfinals or enter a tiebreaker.

Pat Simmons and his Winnipeg squad also managed to squeak through to 2-1 stealing in an extra end to edge China’s Rui Liu 7-5. Liu is out of the tournament at 0-4.

Simmons rushed out to a 4-0 in the first half with a three count in the second and a steal of one in the fourth. Liu wiped out the deficit and pulled ahead with a deuce in five followed by steals of one in the sixth and two in the seventh when Simmons’ last shot picked and promoted an opposing guard into the count.

“We played a really good first five ends and had a couple ends where we had a chance to get out of it and really put the screws to them kind of thing and just missed a few opportunities and gave up a deuce,” Simmons said. “We were still in good shape and then things got messy and tricky. We got a few bad breaks and I was kind of just letting the rock go and we had multiple rocks that were just gone. Both teams actually, it wasn’t just us. It got dicey and no shots were gimmes out there in the end for the last three ends for sure.”

The two-time Brier champion Simmons shook it off in eight and almost lost it again, but managed to bump the counter for shot stone to tie it and require an extra end.

“That’s experience a little bit. You just try and quickly put that behind you and try to play a great end, which we did,” Simmons said. “He made a great shot on his last one [in eight] and then mine soft picked again, which we actually got lucky to get one and force the extra.”

Simmons had the charm in OT stealing two as Liu’s last also caught something and took a turn for the worse hooking into his own guard.

“His last one picked for sure,” Simmons said. “He got unlucky there as well so the last half of the game we didn’t know what was going to happen basically from rock to rock. There were all kinds of things that were happening. So yeah, it was one of those games.”

Lyburn (1-2) picked up his first win to stay in the hunt scoring three in the eighth to come back and beat Greg Drummond of Scotland 8-7. Drummond has been eliminated from playoff contention with a 0-3 record.

The BOOST National is the third event and second major of the 2017-18 Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling season and features 15 of the best men’s teams and 15 of the best women’s teams from around the globe.

Round-robin play runs through to Friday with the top eight on each side qualifying for the weekend playoffs.

TV coverage resumes Friday at Noon ET on Sportsnet, Sportsnet NOW (Canada) and gsoc.yaretv.com (international).