It seemed as if everything was going well for Yorkton’s Steve Laycock during the men’s final of the Canadian Open at the Gallagher Centre on Sunday afternoon.
The hometown crowd was behind him, he was leading Newfoundland’s Brad Gushue 5-4 late in the eighth end and he had just pulled off a near perfect shot in which his sweepers, second Colton Flasch and lead Dallan Muyres, finessed his final rock past the guards and onto the top of the button to force Gushue’s hand.
But Gushue remained unfazed, seeing Laycock’s near perfect shot and delivering a perfect one of his own, relying on the sweeping of lead Geoff Walker and second Brett Gallant to work the rock past the guards and freeze it onto his own shot rock, giving the 34-year-old St. John’s native a deuce and a 6-5 win in the Canadian Open, his second Grand Slam event title of the year and third of his career after winning the 2014 Masters in Selkirk and The National in Guelph, Ont., in 2010.
However things didn’t go as smoothly for the Gushue rink during the Canadian Open final as they did at the Masters in Selkirk. “Brett (Gallant) made a great comment there during the ceremony that we never led for one end during the playoffs other than after the final end in all three games,” laughed Gushue. “We were down one against Jacobs and got two, we were tied up without the hammer against Koe and stole and then we were down one and got two again in the last game, so things went our way this week.
“We didn’t necessarily play good but we made some big shots at the right time.”
The biggest of course being their final one, where they took advantage of a rare Laycock mistake to score a deuce for the win; something the hometown skip acknowledged after the game. “We were in control for most of the game but it was just a little bit of a mistake there, the line was good and we could have got on it and maybe even bumped it (Gushue’s shot rock) a bit but once we left that little opening I knew that he was going to be close, if not make it.
“I knew pretty much the whole second half of the sheet that he had it so it was kind of disheartening to not have really much to hope for there but at least we forced him to make a tough shot.”
Gushue too, acknowledged the fact that Laycock made a great shot, but still left enough of an opening for him to steal the victory away from the hometown hero. “Steve made a nice shot but left me enough room on the in turn to make a draw to the button,” offered the 2014 Canadian Open champion skip. “I wasn’t sure what that spot was going to do but I made a good guess and I threw it good and when it went in there I was pretty excited because it didn’t look like we were going to win that game for the first seven and three quarter ends.”
In fact it was Laycock, playing in front of family and friends, who seemed destined to win the game for much of the way, taking the lead in the first end with a deuce, only to give up a pair to Gushue in the second end before regaining the lead in the third with a single.
Laycock then stole one in the fourth end when, with Laycock lying two, Gushue’s final rock over curled to give the hometown hero shot rock and a 4-2 lead midway through the game.
A rare mistake by Laycock in the fifth end gave Gushue a chance to draw for two. Something he did, sending the game into the sixth end deadlocked at fours.
A blank sixth end saw Laycock carry the hammer into the seventh, where it looked like Gushue would take advantage of some misplayed shots. However Laycock regained control, first clearing two Gushue rocks out of the house with his first rock before drawing to the button with his second to score one and take a 5-4 lead into the final end where Gushue, like he did in the quarter and semi-finals, came through once again to score a deuce and steal victory from the jaws of defeat.
But while Gushue celebrated the victory, Laycock was left to his own thoughts.
However while most would dwell on their most recent defeat, Laycock instead chose to look at the positives. “It’s probably among the best events that we’ve has as a team,” said Laycock. “So we can’t be disappointed about that. It would have been nice to get a win here just because I know how tough it is to get to the finals of a Slam, so to get this chance and not pull through is a bit disappointing but we’re still happy with the week and the crowd was great all week.
“And the fact that we played a really competitive game against a top notch team like them I think is good too. We’ve has this belief in ourselves, it was just a matter of getting a chance to showcase it and hopefully we can keep doing this on a consistent basis now.”
In addition to beating Laycock 6-5 in the Canadian Open men’s final, Gushue also beat Brad Jacobs 6-5 and Kevin Koe 5-4 to make it the final.
Laycock disposed of quarterfinal opponent Jim Cotter 6-5 in extra ends and Brendan Bottcher 6-5 in the semi-final to qualify for his first Grand Slam final.
Laycock also defeated Niklas Edin (8-5), Glenn Howard (6-4) and John Epping (6-4) while falling 8-3 to Mike McEwen to finish with a total record of 5-2 throughout the tournament.
