Stoughton locks up playoff berth

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This article was published 06/04/2011 (5498 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

REGINA — Winnipeg’s Jeff Stoughton is two wins away from his second world curling championship.

Team Canada’s Stoughton thrashed Sweden’s Niklas Edin 10-6 in eight ends here at the 2011 World Men’s Curling Championship Wednesday afternoon to improve to 9-0 and lock up a spot in the Page playoff 1 vs 2 game Friday night.

The winner of the 1 vs 2 game will advance straight to Sunday evening’s world championship final, while the loser will get a second chance in Saturday evening’s semifinal.

“It’s really awesome. It’s been a great week so far,” Stoughton said Wednesday, “but we got lots of work still to do. We’re not going to let the train stop. We’re going to keep on rolling.”

Stoughton once again jumped out to an early lead against Sweden and then never looked back — a formula for success that he has been using every game for the last two days.

This time it came in the form of a four-ender in the second end. Already lying two, Stoughton tapped back a Swedish stone to double his tally to four and take a 4-1 lead.

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Edin made a great shot in the third end to score a deuce and get back into the game at 4-3 but Stoughton sealed the deal in the fourth end, making an angle-raised double tapback for a three-ender and a commanding 7-3 lead.

“It’s a lot of fun going out there right now,” said Canada third Jon Mead. “Their aren’t a lot of chinks in the armour. Jeff might be the best player in this thing. So if we just give him chances, good things are going to happen.”

Team Canada is now done for the day. They return to the ice on Thursday for two final round-robin games, taking on China (3-5) Thursday morning and then closing out their round-robin against Norway (4-4) on the final draw Thursday evening.

Stoughton needs to win just one of his final two round-robin games to secure the hammer advantage for the 1 vs 2 game.

Scotland’s Tommy Brewster remains in second place, two wins behind Canada at 7-1, following a 7-3 win Wednesday afternoon over Denmark. In other games, China beat Korea 9-5 and Germany beat France 6-5.