Neufeld eager to curl for his country at worlds

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This article was published 27/03/2019 (2677 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

B.J. Neufeld’s last uniform had an irregular fit to it, but he’ll be suitably attired next week in Lethbridge, Alta.

The Winnipegger tosses third rocks on Kevin Koe’s Calgary-based curling team, which is preparing to represent Canada at the world men’s curling championship. The nine-day, 13-team championship begins Saturday.

Neufeld will be wearing Canadian colours, just three weeks after Koe’s Alberta team captured the Brier national crown at Brandon’s Westoba Place. The 33-year-old curler, the designated ‘import’ on the Koe crew, said Wednesday he didn’t embrace the notion of representing Alberta at the Brier but is eager to curl for his country.

“It was a bit strange representing Alberta. I still consider myself a Manitoban, obviously. The Brier has kind of morphed into an event where you’re just trying to make the best teams possible, and, in a lot of cases, that’s going to require having someone that’s out of province,” Neufeld said during a conference call with the rest of Team Canada. “You kind of lose sight about what province you’re representing, especially this go-around for me. It wasn’t really in my mind too much about representing Alberta.

“I know at previous Briers it meant a lot to wear the buffalo and you have that sentimental feeling in the event that you’re really trying hard to win a championship for the province, so that was maybe a little bit lost for myself in the Brier.”

Neufeld competed in three previous Briers with the Mike McEwen team out of Winnipeg’s Fort Rouge club. They won back-to-back Manitoba titles in 2016 and ‘17, and earned a spot at the 2018 Canadian championship as Team Wild-Card.

But the team had its struggles on the national stage and disbanded not long after the 2018 Brier in Regina.

Neufeld was immediately recruited by Koe, a winner of two world titles and four Canadian championships. And the first time at the Brier together was, indeed, a charm for Koe, Neufeld, second Colton Flasch (another newcomer to the group) and longtime Koe lead, Ben Hebert.

“It’s going to be cool representing the Maple Leaf now. Obviously, (I am) a super proud Canadian, definitely going to have that feeling now going into this championship that I’m representing a country — a country I’m proud to be a part of,” said Neufeld. “Definitely, there’s a part of me that wants to win it for the country, not only for my teammates and our families.”

Team Canada begins its quest for a world title with a pair of games Saturday at the Enmax Centre in Lethbridge, just 215 kilometres southeast of Calgary. Koe opens against SooHyuk Kim of Korea on the 3 p.m. draw and then takes on Russia’s Sergey Glukhov at 8 p.m. TSN will provide live coverage of Canada’s round-robin games, as well as all playoff games.

Notable squads in Lethbridge include defending world champion Niklas Edin of Sweden, John Shuster from the United States, who captured the gold medal at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, and Switzerland’s Peter De Cruz, who beat Koe in the Olympic bronze-medal final.

Koe’s team underwent a revision after the disappointing Olympics finish.

After opening the Alberta playdowns 1-2 in early February, Koe posted five consecutive wins to secure a Brier berth. In Brandon a month later, the foursome ran the table, a perfect 13-0, including a 4-3 victory over Team Wild-Card’s Brendan Bottcher in the final on a dramatic last-rock, double-takeout for a deuce in the 10th end

The unit had a special blend right from the beginning, said Neufeld, who had been practising in Winnipeg but reunited with his teammates Tuesday in Calgary for their final tune-up.

“Obviously, everyone is a pretty good curler. I think that our demeanors are all similar and we have a good balance of character on our team,” he said. “I think Kevin and I have a lot of similarities, we get along in the house and we see the game the same way. Then, Ben and Colton (are) a bit of the jokesters, they keep things light.

“The two opposites kind of marry well together to form a really good unit — just four guys that have a lot in common. Off the ice we have lots to talk about, we’re all sports nuts and love talking about sports. I think on the ice we have a really good mix, and off (the ice) we have a lot in common, so it’s pretty easy.”

Expectations will be lofty for Koe, as they invariably are for any Canadian team heading into a major international curling event, particularly one possessing home-ice advantage. Koe’s previous world titles came in 2010 at Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy, and in 2016 at Basel, Switzerland, while he settled for fourth in 2014 at Beijing.

This will be his first chance to wear the Maple Leaf in his own backyard, as it were.

“It’ll be a different experience but I’m sure it will be exciting. We’re expecting to have quite a few friends, family and fans. I think we’ll embrace that and enjoy it. We’ll have pretty much a full arena cheering for us the whole week, and that’ll definitely help us on,” said Koe. “I don’t think it will put too much added pressure on us. We’re Team Canada at a world curling championship. That’s fine. There’s nothing to say that’s not fair or not warranted. We expect a lot out of ourselves, too.”

So, too, did the Team Canada last week in Denmark. But things went south in a hurry for Calgary’s Chelsea Carey, who now has the dubious honour of skipping the first Canadian team to miss the playoffs in 20 years at the world women’s curling championship. The vitriol on social media directed at Carey was not unlike the nastiness that followed the Olympic collapses of both Koe and Rachel Homan of Ontario.

Hebert said criticism directed toward the Canadian women was totally unfair.

“Social media can be a bit of joke like that. Everybody has a voice behind the keyboard. It can be a good thing and it can be used as a bad thing, as it was last week for Chelsea’s team. Obviously, no athete deserves that and everyone’s out there trying their best,” said Hebert, who won world crowns with legendary skip Kevin Martin in 2008 and ‘09.

“The game has changed a lot, and the success of Canada… (it) has driven these other world teams to build good teams and be competitive week in, week out. Certainly, it’s a lot tougher to win than it was 10 years ago, but we’re confident in our abilities that if we go out we’re still going to have a good chance,” he added. “I don’t want the expectations to change. It comes with the territory.”

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPJasonBell