Burtnyk a triumph of will over adversity

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/12/2001 (8983 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

REGINA — Former U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren once said that he always read the sports section first. The front section, he reasoned, was full of men’s failures.

But the sports section, Warren argued, was filled with men’s triumphs.

And that’s just what Winnipeg curler Kerry Burtnyk has been this past week at the Canadian Curling Trials to determine Canada’s representative at the 2002 Winter Olympics — a triumph of will over adversity. Burtnyk will face Edmonton’s Kevin Martin in today’s men’s final (12:30 p.m., TSN).

First, it was his battle over cancer that saw him undergo surgery and aggressive radiation therapy just this summer, leaving him with a nasty scar on his scalp.

Then he began the Trials last weekend with one loss, and then another, and then another. It would be easy to excuse Burtnyk for throwing in the towel or look for a scapegoat.

But he did none of those things. Instead, Burtnyk calmly emerged from the ice following each loss and faced the media with class, calm and even some self-deprecating humour.

Winnipeg curler and former Brier champ Vic Peters said prior to the start of the event that he thought Burtnyk would be hard-pressed to make a playoff spot at the Trials.

But Peters also stressed that he wouldn’t dare count out a man like Burtnyk — someone he considered as mentally tough as anyone in the sport.

And how prescient that was. With his back to the wall, Burtnyk rattled off victory after victory. And with each passing win, he would observe with a chuckle that the media throng waiting for him seemed to be growing.

And then with Burtnyk back in the thick of it, the media’s questions turned to his health — a subject he has made it clear that he’s not fond talking about publicly. But he answered each and every cancer question with grace. And to his credit, he refused to draw a trite link between his battle back from cancer and his battle back from 0-3.

To equate the two would have been to trivialize the former. And no matter how hard the media pressed, Burtnyk stood all week by the same mantra — “Curling is just a game. It’s not life and death.”

And so he just quietly went about his business here this week, bailing out his team time and again as each of his teammates — Keith Fenton, Rob Meakin and Jeff Ryan — alternately struggled.

But never Burtnyk. It was a commanding performance and a show of leadership similar to that shown recently by New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter, another athlete who can quietly, but unmistakably, take control of a game single-handedly.

But never Burtnyk. It was a commanding performance and a show of leadership similar to that shown recently by New York Yankees shortstop Derek Jeter, another athlete who can quietly, but unmistakably, take control of a game single-handedly.

For Jeter, the best example was that spectacular flip to the plate he made in the American League playoffs against Oakland this fall.

For Burtnyk, it was the freeze in the fifth end of Friday night’s semifinal against Bert Gretzinger of British Columbia.

Sure, they are different men playing vastly different sports. But the measure of their accomplishments is the same.

The one big difference being, of course, that Jeter is worth more than $100 million and dates Miss Universe. Burtnyk, on the other hand, is a family man who will return home to West St. Paul following today’s game — win or lose — to the same modest life that’s always been his.

And it’s for that reason — and all the others — that Burtnyk would truly be one of the great stories of the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake City should he qualify by beating Martin today.

Now, there’s an old saying among sportswriters: “No cheering in the press box — except for good stories and deadlines.”

Well, the final is an afternoon game so there won’t be any deadline pressure.

But you’ll have to pardon me if I do a little cheering of my own. Not for Manitoba, not even for Burtnyk.

But for a truly inspirational story of one man’s triumph.

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paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca