Former world and Brier champion Ed Lukowich is philosophical about the fact his team didn't win the provincial Masters curling championship in Olds.
He figures that's because of his curling resume and the fact his team not only won the Alberta Seniors and Masters championships last year, but also won the national Masters championship.
"Well, we won last year and of course this year, we're probably a bit of a target," he said during an interview with the Albertan.
As reported earlier, the Fred Armstrong rink of Red Deer won the men's side and the Diane Foster rink of Calgary won the ladies' side of the tournament, held Feb. 22-26 at the Olds Curling Club.
"Everybody probably came to this event - the other seven teams probably came to this event saying, ëwell, we want to - our big game is against Ed Lukowich because he won last year.' But I'm very used to that, so it's not a big deal, OK. But on the other hand, we didn't play too well," he said.
Early in the tournament, he played a very aggressive style.
"If you're talking non-aggressive, a non-aggressive style would be that - playing in the rings and hitting and hitting and hitting; playing takeouts so there's really nothing much in play - you might have one or two rocks in play for the whole end, and somebody might get one or there might be a blank end, so you're not going to get a lot of scoring," Lukowich said.
"I was playing very aggressively. I'm playing in front of the rinks to get a field of play. We're getting all sorts of rocks coming in behind and all this.
"We didn't make the best shots in those situations, so all of a sudden, they've got two or three buried in here with some guards and we've got a really tough shot.
"This works if it's your three rocks in here. But if it happens to be the other guy and he gets his three rocks in here, well then he's counting the points.
"It's a style I love to play. We go after a lot of teams aggressively early in the game and when it works we can usually beat 'em like maybe 8-3 or something. But if it's not working, we're playing catch-up," he added.
Part way through the tournament, Lukowich changed his strategy, but it was too late. When interviewed, his record in the tournament was 2-2.
"We have to do the old Green Bay Packers and run the table here, sort of thing, you know -- hopefully.
"In curling in particular, you're never out of it. If it was a tennis match and you're down 6-love, 6-1 or something like that, it's probably just about over," he said.
"But in curling, quite often, you'll get down to that last event or that last chance and (that's when) some of the good curlers really start playing. They play well when they're on their last life, hanging by a thread."
That didn't happen for his team this time, but Lukowich said that's the way the game goes. He said they just didn't play well enough.
He said he can't blame anything else - the ice was good and the tournament was run well.
"It's a style I love to play. We go after a lot of teams aggressively early in the game and when it works we can usually beat 'em like maybe 8-3 or something. But if it's not working, we're playing catch-up."ED LUKOWICH
