The 2024 LGT World Men’s Curling Championship is well underway and Team Canada is so far one of the top squads at the event.
Team Gushue, representing Canada, clinched a playoff spot after a 7-4 victory over Norway earlier today and has their eyes set on this weekend's playoffs.
“It was better than last night but not as sharp as we can be,” Gushue said to Curling Canada staff after the win against Norway.
“We still had a couple of sloppy misses and sloppy shots that against a team like (Sweden’s) Niklas tonight or another top team, we may not get away with it.”
The Canadians are currently 8-2, with their only losses of the event against Sweden and Italy.
Team Gushue is comprised of skip Brad Gushue, vice-skip Mark Nichols, second EJ Harnden, lead Geoff Walker, alternate Kyle Doering, coach Caleb Flaxey and national coach Jeff Stoughton.
Currently, the team is tied for second place in the standings with two round-robin matches left in their schedule (Japan and Switzerland on Friday).
If the Canadians manage to stay in second place or better by the end of Friday, they will bypass the qualification game on Saturday and secure a berth in the semifinals.
“We want to get into those semifinals. You want to avoid that qualification game,” Nichols said.
“We had to go through it last year, and it’s a ton of pressure because you know if you’re in it, you’re going to be playing a really tough team.”
The tournament’s playoffs kick off on Saturday.
