Bryan Burgess had plenty of it early, then held on to edge a charging Robbie Gordon 7-5 on Monday night at Fort William Curling Club, improving to 2-1 at the Northern Ontario provincial men’s curling championship.
Sudbury’s Gordon, who came into the match with a win and a loss, caught an unfortunate break in the second end when his final shot picked facing a pair of Burgess rocks in the rings, setting the Thunder Bay skip for an easy triple.
“That was definitely a big turning point early in the game,” said Burgess, whose team includes lead Pat Berezowski, second Dale Wiersema and third Gary Weiss.
“He was throwing a double and it picked and we got three. They are a great team and lucky for us we got the three early.”
A steal in the third end gave Burgess a commanding 4-0 lead, but Gordon wasn’t giving up just yet.
Burgess, who failed to make a pair of double takeouts with his skip stones in the fourth, could only watch helplessly as Gordon drew to the rings for a pair and cut the lead in half.
In the fifth, with a house full of yellow and blue rocks, Gordon’s yellow stones found themselves surrounding the button, with Burgess’s blue stones as backing. Burgess attempted to feather his final shot into the button, but just didn’t have the power to get it there, giving up a steal of one and taking a 4-3 lead into the second half of the game.
“We couldn’t run away with it. Like I said, they’re a great team and they made a ton of shots. We just had to play that way and keep control,” Burgess said.
The difference, he added, was what all children are taught in school.
“I think it was patience. Taking the three early was big, and then it was just having patience and coming down to the last end with the hammer.”
After blanking the sixth end with the hammer, Burgess scored a pair in the seventh to up his lead to three. Gordon drew to the button for one in the eighth. Then when Burgess came up short in the ninth on his final shot, Gordon found himself within one heading home.
But after his third, Sandy MacEwan, had his second shot pick the end quickly fell into Burgess’s favour and when Gordon’s final shot of the night didn’t have enough gas to make it into scoring position, the two sides shook hands.
Monday night also saw Mike Pozihun and Jeff Currie in yet another battle of Thunder Bay.
But with both teams checking in at 1-2, it was essentially a must-win for both teams, despite it only being Day 2 of competition.
Pozihun , who curls with lead Aaron Rogalski, second B.J. Skinner and third Deron Surkan out of Port Arthur Curling Club, used a steal of one in the fifth to take a 4-2 lead and stole one in the 10th to rule out a comeback and climb back to .500.
“It feels great,” he said. “Jeff’s got a great team and it was a really hard-fought game. It was one we really needed. We were 1-2 and needed to bring it up.”
Going 1-3 was not an option if he wanted to stay in contention, and he knew it.
“There are so many good teams. If you get a couple below .500, it’s a tough battle. I mean we’ve played great teams, but I look down the line and there are a lot of good teams left to play.”
The news wasn’t as great for the fourth Thunder Bay squad on Monday night. Mike Assad entered play 2-0, but fell behind early and despite a late charge, just couldn’t overcome two-time champion Mike Jakubo, who beat Assad 6-4.
The key blow was a steal of three for Jakubo in the second end.
Like Burgess, Lady Luck had a say in the win, his second of the day. Unfortunately for Assad, she favoured his Copper Cliff, Ont. opponent.
“It turns out we had a straight rock that cost us three points in the second end. We probably still would have given him one, but we wouldn’t have given him the three. We ended up getting down 4-0. And against a team like Jakubo, who’s been to the Brier twice, it’s tough to come back from four down.
“We figured out the rocks, changed them around and had a good last half. So we can take that as a positive from here anyway.”
Standings
| Team | W | L |
|---|---|---|
| Jacobs | 3 | 0 |
| Salo | 3 | 1 |
| Scharf | 3 | 0 |
| Assad | 2 | 1 |
| Burgess | 2 | 1 |
| Jakubo | 2 | 1 |
| Pozihun | 2 | 2 |
| Currie | 1 | 3 |
| Gordon | 1 | 2 |
| Montpellier | 1 | 3 |
| MacInnes | 0 | 3 |
| Nordin | 0 | 3 |
