Manitoba falls to P.E.I. at Tim Hortons Brier

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This article was published 06/03/2015 (4158 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CALGARY — Manitoba’s Reid Carruthers lost 5-2 to PEI’s Adam Casey on the final round-robin draw here at the Tim Hortons Brier Friday morning.

With the loss, Manitoba finishes this year’s Brier round-robin at 4-7 — the second worst record ever posted by a Manitoba team at the Brier since the round-robin went to a 12-team format in 1975.

Three Manitoba teams have posted a 3-8 record since then — Lloyd Gunnlaugson in 1983, John Bubbs in 2003 and Brent Scales in 2004. Carruther’s joins Deloraine’s Duane Edwards, who also finished 4-7 in 1990.

Manitoba finished ninth overall in the round-robin standings, ahead of only New Brunswick (2-9) and Northwest Territories (0-11).

It was all a bitter pill to swallow for a Manitoba foursome — third Braeden Moskowy, second Derek Samagalski and lead Colin Hodgson — who had high hopes coming into this event after defeating the likes of Jeff Stoughton and Mike McEwen in capturing the Manitoba title last month.

To his everlasting credit, Carruthers never ducked any questions and took full responsibility for his team’s failures as the losses mounted late in the week. Manitoba lost five of their last six games and Carruthers insisted on Friday that his team’s problems began and ended with him.

“Everyone on my team didn’t shoot 100 percent. But at the same time, they played well enough to win,” Carruthers said after the loss to PEI. “I just missed some key shots throughout the week. There was a couple games that could have gone our way if I’d make a couple more shots. I’d say it’s more on my shoulders than anybody else. I’m really happy with how the guys played.”

Despite their poor record, Manitoba actually shot some very high percentages here over the last week. As a team, they shot 88 percent — tied with Northern Ontario for second best in the field. Hodgson led all leads at 95 percent, Samagalski was third among seconds at 88 percent and Moskowy was third among thirds at 89 percent.

Only Carruthers struggled, shooting 79 percent — eighth among skips. But his teammates were having nothing to do with the idea that this debacle was all the fault of their skip.

“We put a lot of effort into having good team dynamics and as a team we obviously didn’t rub them the right way to help Reid,” said Hodgson. “That’s on us and something we’re going to need re-evaluate and get better at.”

The four-team Brier playoff picture was settled on the final round-robin draw Friday morning. Saskatchewan’s Steve Laycock defeated B.C.’s Jim Cotter 4-2 to finish 7-4 and clinch the final playoff berth. Saskatchewan will now play Team Canada in Saturday’s page playoff 3 vs 4 game.

The 1 vs 2 game between Northern Ontario’s Brad Jacobs and Newfoundland’s Brad Gushue is Friday night.

A loss by Saskatchewan Friday morning would have triggered tiebreakers involving four different teams at 6-5.

email: paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek