TORONTO — Wayne Middaugh and Team Bottcher defeated Brad Gushue’s rink 6-4 during Saturday’s Players’ Championship quarterfinals at the Mattamy Athletic Centre.
Skip Brendan Bottcher had to leave after the round-robin stage and head back home to Edmonton to wrap up university and Wayne Middaugh, from Coldwater, Ont., is filling in during the playoffs.
“Poor Brendan had to write his exam today and they needed a player,” Middaugh explained. “I happened to be local so I seemed to be the guy they wanted so it was a nice fit. It’s only for the playoffs and it worked out that they needed me. I was actually a little bit nervous because I wanted to play well for them.”
With the game tied 4-4, Gushue, from St. John’s, N.L., hit and rolled too far with his last in the seventh end and Middaugh made an open hit to get a deuce for the two-point advantage coming home. Middaugh then nailed a double takeout with his final shot in the eighth to run Gushue out of rocks.
“You’ve got a pretty reasonable shot to win the game,” Middaugh said. “You want to make sure you give it a good chance because it’s a big deal to make that.”
It was a tight matchup as the rinks alternated deuces through one and two and singles through three and four. Middaugh faced three in the fifth and made the draw to the button to go ahead 4-3. Gushue tied it while facing four in the sixth but made it for shot by ticking off of two Middaugh stones to score.
Middaugh, who has won 15 career Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling titles, edged former (and future) teammate Glenn Howard 6-4 in the tiebreaker. The Coldwater, Ont., skip stepped back from competitive curling this season but will return to Team Howard in the fall.
“It was a bad, tough spot having to play Glenn,” Middaugh said. “That was uncomfortable but as a token you want a team to actually play and I’m going to give 110 percent and we got lucky that Glenn didn’t have his best stuff.
“Glenn just gave me some opportunities and we took advantage of them.”
Team “Middaughtcher” now go up against Team Brad Jacobs, of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont. The reigning Olympic champions earned a direct bye to the semifinals after finishing the round robin with a 4-1 record to make the top two seeds.
Players’ Championship: Men’s Scores | Women’s Scores | Standings
Elsewhere, Toronto’s John Epping made the sold-out hometown crowd happy by advancing to the semis with a 6-4 victory over Calgary’s Kevin Koe.
Epping got a deuce in the second and held Koe to a single in three. He added another point in the fourth and stole two in the fifth to go up 5-1. Koe got a deuce in the sixth and Epping picked up a single in the seventh to make it 6-3 coming home. Koe held shot stone in eight but missed the angle raise attempt with his final throw to potentially score more and shook hands.
Team Epping plays Winnipeg’s Mike McEwen, who rolled through the round robin with a perfect 5-0 record.
The women’s semifinals see Ottawa’s Rachel Homan face Scotland’s Eve Muirhead and Edmonton’s Val Sweeting takes on Russia’s Anna Sidorova.
Both men’s and women’s semifinals start Sunday at 10 a.m. ET. Watch live on Sportsnet East, Ontario, West and Pacific and on Sportsnet NOW.