Sunday At The Brier

Sunday At The Brier

LONDON, ON – I am sitting on the media bench, slightly hungover, watching the Sunday morning Brier tilt between Koe and Horgan/Moulding.

It’s definitely a different experience being on the wrong side of the fence from the games. The most common question I am getting this week is: do you miss it?

Quick answer: OF COURSE.

I miss the adrenaline rush of playing in front of a crowd. I feel it when you get the crowd murmur that precedes a big shot—and then the cheer when it happens.

I miss the uniforms. There is something about the colors and the pageantry of the provincial (or Wild Card) shirts that add something to the game. The curlers aren’t decked out like sponsor-covered NASCAR drivers. There is a simple elegance to the game when your biggest logo is a moose or a sailboat.

I miss the ice. For club curlers, it is tough to explain how different the ice is at the Brier. It slides better. Even though the stopwatch usually shows something similar to what you would get in a club. It is faster.

So yes. I miss it.

The Brier is spectacular. I brought a friend of mine to the championship this year, and this was his first time at a big curling event, so I got the perspective of someone who had only watched the game on TV. He was blown away by the atmosphere of live curling. He was amazed at the fact that you become friends with the people around you in the stands.

I was sitting yesterday next to a nice lady from Virginia. She started watching curling at the 2010 Olympics and has loved the game ever since. She decided to leave her husband behind and drive 19 hours to London to watch curling for the week. On the other side of us was a guy decked out in full Saskatchewan Roughriders gear, watching his nephew play on a team for Saskatchewan. I also just met Luba, a volunteer working on the media bench who came here from Thunder Bay.

That is the Brier.

As we inevitably get into the next round of “how do we fix the Brier” discussions over the next few weeks, let’s make sure we remember that this event is special, not just because of the teams on the ice. It is about the lady who got into her car and drove 19 hours. It is about the volunteers. I am pretty sure they don’t give a flying f**k about residency rules and how many wild card teams get invited.

What do I see so far from this side of the fence?

• Highlight so far for the crowd: Jake Higgs earning Nunavut their first ever Brier win against a young Newfoundland team. This is a nice story: Jake is from Ontario, but flew up to Iqaluit to qualify for the Brier. Nunavut was 0-38 in the Brier leading up to that game. To be honest, it was not the best played game and was more a question of who missed less, but it shows that the crowd at the Brier appreciates the game and the moment.

• I was watching the Gushue vs McEwen game last night, which had an amazing finish by Mike to pull off the win. But there was a four or five-end period in the middle of the game where Gushue was one up with hammer and tried to not play. He took no chances, peeled anything that even looked like a guard, and passed on more than a few chances to turn up the heat. And it was Bo-Ring.

I sometimes just don’t get why the best teams in the sport, who have the most to benefit from the game being fun and exciting, seem so intent on making it as boring as humanly possible.

• Quebec has looked pretty flat so far. Insider knowledge: Felix has an on-switch which has not yet been flipped to “on.” My bet is it will kick on at some point, and they will beat either Bottcher or Gushue. You heard it here first.