It’s redemption time

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This article was published 05/02/2002 (8895 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

MIKE Harris knows better than anyone the huge expectations faced by a Canadian men’s curling team in the Winter Olympics. And the consequences of failing to live up to them.

Harris, you will recall, won silver for Canadian men’s curling at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano.

Now, silver is a great accomplishment in a country where Olympic medals of any kind are few and far between.

However, when you are a Canadian curler, it is not the colour Canadians expect you to return home with.

So, while Sandra Schmirler was given a royal welcome when she returned home from Nagano with curling gold, Harris returned home to a decidedly icy reception from his friends in the curling community who wanted to know not why he had won silver but, rather, why he had lost gold.

They also asked why he had curled just 25 per cent in a loss to Switzerland’s Patrick Hurlimann in the gold-medal final.

Actually, Harris curled 25 per cent in that final game because he was suffering from a little condition known as viral pneumonia. That he was even walking in the gold-medal game — much less curling — was a miracle in itself.

However, the question persisted: Did Harris choke in the biggest game of his life?

Tough crowd, these curling types.

“It was very bittersweet,” Harris mused last week about his Olympic experience. “Outside the curling world, the reception was unbelievably phenomenal — ‘Wow, a silver medal.’

“But the curlers had higher expectations . . . And it was disappointing not to have won when we went is as favourite.

“It’s not even an issue now. Four years later, it gets better. It will always be the highlight of my curling resume . . . But at the time, it was very (bittersweet).”

It is against that backdrop that Edmonton’s Kevin Martin will take to the ice in Ogden, Utah, for his first game of the Winter Olympics round-robin Feb. 11.

Raising the stakes even further for Martin is the fact that, unlike Harris, Martin will be carrying with him a mountain of international curling baggage when he slides out of the hack for the first time.

While Martin undeniably is one of the greatest male curlers of his generation, he has yet to win internationally.

With two previous trips to the Worlds, one trip to the junior Worlds and one trip to the Winter Olympics in 1992, when curling was still a demonstration sport, Martin has yet to win gold.

Compounding those failures has been the way Martin lost. In 1991 at the Worlds at the Winnipeg Arena, Martin fell behind Scotland’s David Smith early in the game and then pulled out some corn brooms in an effort to junk up the ice.

Martin went on to lose the game 7-2 and was lambasted afterward by Smith, who famously chastised the Canadian for messing with the sanctity of a gentleman’s game by pulling out “those filthy corn brooms.”

It was a blemish set in motion by a shot in the first end that Martin said still keeps him awake at night.

Asked during the Canadian Curling Trials in Regina in December if he had any regrets over the years, Martin was blunt. “Any regrets?,” he repeated. “Just one — ’91 Worlds, first end, in-turn tap for five.”

Alas, Martin missed the tap, Smith stole the end, the brooms came out and the rest, as they say, is history.

Then, still stinging from the corn-broom debacle, Martin dug himself in even deeper the next year when his team lost the bronze-medal game at the 1992 Winter Olympics in Albertville in a fiasco that saw Martin third Kevin Park show up late for the game.

Put it altogether and the 2002 Winter Olympics seem destined to end for Martin in one of two ways — total redemption or eternal damnation.

Because, if Martin fails to win gold, the reception Harris received in 1998 will seem positively warm in comparison to what will await Martin upon his return to Canada.

However, if Martin should win gold: “All those losses will be erased completely,” predicts Harris. “It’s a great opportunity for Kevin.”

MEET THE COMPETITION

Canada

Skip — Kevin Martin

A two-time Canadian champ, Martin is also among the winningest cashspielers in curling history. But he’s struggled mightily on the international stage and will be looking to win his first international event in Salt Lake City.

FAST Fact: Martin lead Don Bartlett has said Sweden’s Peter Lindholm has beaten the Martin rink every time they’ve faced in recent memory. He figures it’s been about six times.

Sweden

Skip — Peter Lindholm

At just 31, Lindholm already is a two-time world champ (1997 and 2001) and his 40 wins at the Worlds rank him fourth all-time among skips.

He’s still got something to prove at the biggest bonspiel of them all, however. His team went just 3-4 in the round-robin at the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano and lost a tie-breaker to the United States that would have gotten them into the playoffs.

FAST Fact: The rink was the subject of a McDonald’s commercial during the Nagano Games in which the four team members try to eat a McNugget with chopsticks in the order they shoot on the ice. After the lead through third fails, Lindholm gets the plate and successfully plunks the McNugget in his mouth.

Switzerland

Skip — Andreas Schwaller

Canadians will best remember this team as the one that benefited from a couple of controversial hogline calls in beating Randy Ferbey and company in the semifinals at the 2001 Worlds in Lausanne. The Swiss then went on to lose the final to Sweden 6-3.

FAST Fact: They like to play musical skips on this team. At last year’s Worlds, Schwaller started at skip but later moved to third and was replaced by older brother, Chrisof, who is listed as the team’s fifth this time around.

United States

Skip — Tim Somerville

Son of two-time world champ Bud Somerville, Tim Somerville has struggled on the international scene, failing to medal at three World Championships and the 1998 Nagano Games.

His only international medal came in 1992 in Albertville, when he earned bronze on a rink skipped by his father when curling was still a demonstration sport.

FAST Fact: Somerville’s father initially rebuffed his son’s desire to take up curling, only relenting when, at age 16, Somerville wandered down to the local curling club and took the game up himself.

Norway

Skip — Pal Trulsen

Trulsen skipped his rink to a bronze medal finish at the 2001 Worlds, the first curling medal for a Norwegian men’s team at the Worlds since Eigil Ramsfjell shared a bronze with the U.S. in 1991.

FAST Fact: Trulsen’s third, Lars Vaagberg, is also his brother-in-law.

Finland

Skip — Markku

Uusipaavalniemi

A bronze medallist at the 1998 Worlds and the 2000 Worlds, Uusipaavalniemi continues to impress even though he hails from a country with no dedicated curling ice. They practise at home on an outdoor rink covered by a tent and also use some hockey rinks.

FAST Fact: A computer programmer by trade, Uusipaavalniemi once solved a Rubik’s cube in 25 seconds.

Great Britain

Skip — Hammy McMillan

The 1999 world champ, folks in these parts will best remember this Scottish team as the one that beat Jeff Stougton in an extra end to claim the world title.

McMillan has been to five Worlds in all and also won silver as third in 1986 and as skip in 1992. He also picked up a bronze as skip in 1997. He skipped in the 1992 Winter Olympics when curling was a demonstration sport but he failed to medal.

FAST Fact: McMillan manages a hotel in Stranraer, Scotland.

Denmark

Skip — Ulrik Schmidt

Schmidt’s team has long been coached by Winnipegger (and 1979 Brier champion third for Barry Fry) Bill Carey, who again will be coaching them in Salt Lake City.

Schmidt has skipped teams to three Worlds, in 1997, 1999 and 2000, but so far has failed to medal.

FAST Fact: the Schmidt team curled in the MCA Bonspiel a couple years ago.

Germany

Skip — Sebastian Stock

A relatively unknown team, none of the team is listed in records as having ever participated in a World Curling Championship, although the third, Daniel Herberg, is listed as having been an alternate in 1993.

FAST Fact: Stock is the brother of German women’s lead Andrea Stock.

France

Skip — Dominique Dupont-Roc

The World Curling Federation announced just last week that this team would be replacing the previously announced rink skipped by Thierry Mercier as France’s men’s curling representative in Salt Lake City.

This is the same French team that curled in last year’s Worlds, finishing sixth with a 4-5 round-robin record.

PHOTO

FAST Fact: In three other Worlds, in 1986, 1989 and 1991, Dupont-Roc failed to finish higher than seventh.