Alberta's Kevin Koe qualifies for ninth career Brier final

ST. JOHN’S, N.L. — Veteran skipper Kevin Koe and his Team Alberta have qualified for the Montana’s Brier final with a tenth straight win.

For the 51-year-old Koe, it’ll be a ninth career final at the national championships and a chance to win a fifth career title.

“These are the games I look forward to,” Koe said, shortly after the skipper, third Tyler Tardi, and the front end of Aaron Sluchinski and Karrick Martin beat Matt Dunstone’s Manitoba rink in extra ends, continuing their undefeated streak at Mary Brown’s Centre. 

Dunstone, meanwhile, is still alive, and his Team Manitoba will face Brad Jacobs’s Team Canada, the reigning national and Olympic champions, in Sunday afternoon’s semifinal for a chance at a rematch against Koe with the Tankard on the line. 

Dunstone had a shot to win it in the 10th end with his last, but his attempted run-back double removed just one of Koe’s stones to tie the game and send it to an 11th end, where Koe scored a pair for a 9-7 win. 

“We battled,” said Dunstone, who’s a two-time Brier silver medallist. “Just missed a shot to win it by a centimetre.” 

Earlier Saturday, Jacobs, Marc Kennedy, Brett Gallant and Ben Hebert broke a lot of hearts in Newfoundland and Labrador when they eliminated Brad Gushue and ended the hometown skip’s pursuit of a record-extending seventh and final Brier at his last national championship, since Gushue is retiring. 

The semifinal will be a rematch for Dunstone against the team that beat his in both the Brier final last year and the Olympic Trials final back in November. “Won’t be in the final this time, but looking forward to a crack at the Olympic champs,” he said.

The Manitoba skipper was walking a little gingerly after the game because in the ninth end, he had what he called “a little bit of a tweak” to his right knee while he was rushing one of his shots, up against the clock. Though he showed some obvious discomfort in the moments afterwards, Dunstone finished the game and executed his shots, curling 86 per cent.  

The shot Koe made to win it in 11 was surgical, a run-back takeout double to sit two. 

“It was looking ugly,” Koe said of his team’s outlook in the extra end, adding Martin did an admirable job sweeping, holding the line. “If I don’t make some noise there, make contact, I’m probably not standing here,” the skip added, with a berth to the final. 

Koe, who missed the playoffs the last two years at the Brier, pointed out that many may be surprised to see his team enjoying the success they have had so far.

“I don’t think people gave us much of a chance coming here, for sure,” Koe said. “We would have been middle of the pack ranked, I think. But we had confidence in ourselves, and I had confidence in myself and in the guys.”

If Koe and his Team Alberta can go undefeated and win it, that’ll be a repeat of his last Brier win in 2019. He’s the last skip to go undefeated here, and he isn’t sure if he’ll have a shot at another Tankard after Sunday. 

“It’s the Brier, who knows when it will be my last one,” Koe said. “It could be tomorrow, so it wouldn’t be a better way to go out than hopefully on top.”