Canada's Gushue comes up clutch against China, but falls to Russia in extra ends

BEIJING — Brad Gushue's Canadian men's curling team will advance to the Olympic semifinals if they beat Great Britain on Thursday in the final game of the round robin.

That part of the playoff scenario is simple.

Things get more complicated if they lose. 

The Canadian team could have avoided any medal-round uncertainty had they not dropped a 7-6 extra-end loss to Russia on Tuesday night.

Gushue's rink entered the game riding a three-game win streak, which included a clutch 10-8 victory over China earlier in the day.

After scoring one against Russia in the opening end, Canada played catch-up for the remainder of the match and never regained the lead.

“It's a disappointing game. We gave up so many opportunities," Gushue said following the loss. "We could have scored two or three a number of times in the first five or six ends and then we seemed to give it away every single time"

Trailing 6-4 in the 10th end, Gushue managed to score a pair to force an extra end but could only watch as Russian skip Sergey Glukhov drew to the button with the final rock to seal the victory.

"Sergey made a bunch of good shots to kind of take those away from us once we gave him the opportunity. So credit to him, he played well," Gushue said.

With one game remaining, Canada (5-4) sits third in the standings, just ahead of Russia (4-4) and the United States (4-4). Switzerland follows at 3-4 but has more games left to play.

Only the top four teams at the end of the round robin qualify for the medal round.

Sweden (7-1) and Great Britain (6-1) have already locked up the top two spots.

Gushue can grab a spot in the medal round by finishing off the round robin with a win over the Brits (Wednesday, 10:05 p.m. ET). Failing that, Canada would need at least two of the teams chasing them to lose.

“We will rest up — cheer for whoever we need to cheer for to see if things can go our way — but our fate is still in our own hands. We've got to win our last game, but we've got a tough match against Great Britain, so (we will) just make sure we're ready for that," he said.

Earlier in the day, Gushue made a clutch tap against two in the 10th end to secure the win over China (3-5).

"I was just trying to focus on what I needed to do," Gushue said. "Throw the right way, hit the broom. It was not a very difficult shot. So I was just trying to make sure I threw proper."

Canada appeared to be in control after a three-point eighth end gave Gushue's foursome a 9-6 lead.

China came back with two in the ninth end, and skip Ma Xiuyue drew to the button with his last shot of the 10th to put his team in a position to steal.

Gushue, who curled 90 per cent in the game, was on target with his final shot to give Canada the victory.

"Any win here is a good win," Gushue said. "We played good, we didn't play great. We got a couple of misses out of them in the eighth end, which gave us an opportunity for three (points) and just held on after that.

"If China makes those shots (in the eighth end), we probably only get one, and at seven-six you can never know what could happen."

Canada's women's team was idle Tuesday. Skip Jennifer Jones and her rink were at 3-3 heading into games Wednesday against the United States and China. 

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 15, 2022.

The Canadian Press