News Masters

OKOTOKS, Alta. — Charley Thomas will play the super spare role this week at the WFG Masters.

With St. John’s, N.L., skip Brad Gushue missing his sixth consecutive event to start the season due to a lingering left hip injury, the Didsbury, Alta., native Thomas is filling in at vice on the team. Regular third Mark Nichols has moved up to call the shots while second Brett Gallant and lead Geoff Walker have stayed put in their front-end positions.

Despite Gushue’s absence, the team has maintained the No. 1 spot on the World Curling Tour’s Order of Merit. They’ve qualified for the playoffs in all five of their previous events including a title victory two weeks ago at the Stu Sells Toronto Tankard.

Walker said the team’s mentality hasn’t changed heading into the first Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling major tournament of 2016-17.

“We’re going to expect to go in and still play well and we feel if we play well we’re still good enough to win,” Walker said. “It’s going to be hard without the best player in the world. I mean adding Charley is going to be a great replacement. He’s played well when he’s played with us so far and everything’s been going pretty well.”

Gushue’s injury is a huge setback for the team as they look to maintain their momentum from their banner tour season last year where they won eight events including three Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling championships. On top of that, the Tim Hortons Brier will be played in their hometown and it’s a key season for points towards qualifying for next year’s Olympic Trials.

Team Gushue has relied on a number of spares with Thomas, Adam Spencer and Pat Simmons all getting the call at various points during the season. The WFG Masters will be Thomas’s third tournament with the club after sparing at the Shorty Jenkins Classic in Cornwall, Ont., in September and the Challenge de Curling de Gatineau last week in Quebec.

“A couple of weeks ago Geoff just called me up and asked me if I could play out in the Shorty in Cornwall and I said yes,” Thomas explained, adding with a smile, “I guess they thought I was good enough to keep around.”

It’s a reunion of sorts for Thomas and Walker, who captured the 2006 Canadian junior title and consecutive world junior championships in 2006 and 2007 back in the day together.

Walker said playing with Thomas again feels like the old times.

“It’s interesting for sure,” he said. “Just obviously the success we had in juniors together and it’s fun to have him back. It brings back some memories too.”

Thomas added, “We barely even played against each other in the last couple years so to team up with him again and play with him is a pretty cool experience for sure.”

Flipping back and forth between playing with Team Gushue and his own team hasn’t fazed Thomas, who sees it all as a learning experience.

“It’s a lot different because our two teams function in different ways so it’s tough to kind of make that adjustment, but it doesn’t take long,” Thomas said. “The good thing about this is that you learn a lot from these guys and you can bring it back to your team and make them better.”

The WFG Masters starts Tuesday night at Pason Centennial Arena with Team Gushue’s first game against Team Bottcher during Draw 3 Wednesday at 12:30 p.m. MT.