This Could Be Brad Gushue’s Final Slam Curling Weekend

Don’t look now, but Brad Gushue might be starting his final Grand Slam curling tournament tonight in Saskatchewan – and might miss the final Grand Slam event of the season.

This season’s Players’ Championship runs Jan. 6-11 in Steinbach, Man. That’s almost three months earlier than the traditional April time slot, thanks to Slam owners The Curling Group planning to launch their new professional Rock League property that month.

The World Team Rankings cutoff to get an invitation to the Players’ Championship was yesterday (Dec. 15) and according to the Rankings, assuming no teams decline their invitation, Team Brad Gushue – winners of 15 career Slam titles – might be out of luck.

Gushue, of course, announced this would be his retirement season back in September. Results this year have been thin, with the squad falling to 21st in the global rankings behind teams like Ontario’s Sam Mooibroek, Scotland’s Cameron Bryce and Edmonton’s Evan Van Amsterdam.

The squad ranks a lowly 41st in the year-to-date rankings. They skipped the previous Slam at Lake Tahoe, NV and competed a week earlier in Switzerland, in order to train for the Canadian Olympic Trials, where they finished fourth. 

Slam invitations come from the TCG competition committee, in cooperation with the players’ council, and exceptions to the letter of the rankings law have been made in the past.

Kevin Koe, now a mainstay in Tier 2 of the Slam circuit, received a sponsor’s exemption for October’s Tier 1 Tour Challenge at Nisku, Alta.

As the current season revved into high gear, Ontario’s Mark Kean believed – for months in advance – that he would have a berth locked at his near-hometown Slam in late September. However, the TCG committees went in a different direction.

(Despite a rough go at the Canadian Olympic Pre-Trials in November, Team Kean has qualified for the Canadian Open’s Tier 2 shootout at Martensville this week. They take on Japan’s Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi – who just lost an OQE match for the last Olympic men’s fours berth against China – on Tuesday at 12:00 p.m. CT.)

There’s no question The Curling Group would prefer to not cut Gushue’s retirement tour short, before the crown jewel in the Grand Slam series in January. But it remains to be seen if his squad will appear in Steinbach, and there will surely be many curling fans who are surprised by the speed at which Gushue’s final season is coming to a conclusion.

For now, Team Gushue’s potential final Slam schedule this week will see them take on Italy’s Joel Retornaz (Tuesday at 9:00 p.m. CT), USA’s John Shuster (Wednesday at 9:00 p.m. CT), Brad Jacobs (Thursday at 9:00 p.m. CT) and Matt Dunstone (Friday at 2:30 p.m. CT).

Saturday will feature tiebreakers and playoff (quarterfinal and semifinal) action, with the championship finals scheduled for Sunday.