 A back-and-forth game saw Canada (Photo: Anil Mungal) come out on the winning side 7-6 over Germany. By: Cameron Sallaj It was a strong start to the team competition at the Cortina Olympic Stadium with four men's draws taking the ice Wednesday night and three coming down to last rock. For the Canadian squad of Brad Jacobs, Marc Kennedy, Brett Gallant and Ben Hebert, they opened Olympic action against the German team skipped by Marc Muskatewitz. Starting without hammer, Canada found themselves down early in the game after conceding a deuce to the Germans in the third end, the first score of the game. They quickly bounced back, however, taking two in the fourth before stealing two in the fifth after Muskatewitz' final draw went heavy. This proved to be the turning point in the match with Canada in control heading to six. Coming back from the break, Germany played a strong end, scoring two back to level the score at four-all. Canada's Jacobs then blanked both the seventh and eighth ends, retaining hammer into nine with two ends left to play. Not wanting to allow Canada to blank, Germany elected to draw on their final stone in nine which ultimately went too far, allowing Jacobs a draw to the eight-foot to count two. Then in ten, when it looked like the Canadians had locked up their first win, Muskatewitz executed a perfect angle double, scoring Germany two after a measurement. This sent the game into an extra end with Canada retaining the last rock. In eleven, disaster struck on Marc Kennedy's final stone as he jammed a runback attempt, clearing all Canadian rocks from the rings and leaving Germany lying three. Despite this blunder, Jacobs kept his team alive with a double takeout on his first stone. After Germany's hit-and-roll rolled too far, Jacobs just needed an open hit to score one and give the Canadians a hard fought 7-6 victory. It's been twelve years since Brad Jacobs has competed on Olympic ice and since then he has not missed a beat, picking up where he left off in Sochi when he won the gold medal. His teammates Marc Kennedy and Ben Hebert are also Olympic gold medalists from 2010 while Brett Gallant won bronze in 2022. With experience on their side, the Canadian team is one of the favorites to make a deep run in Cortina. The next opponent for Canada in the nine-game round robin will be the United States' Daniel Casper, a team full of Olympic rookies. They will then face the defending gold medalists Team Niklas Edin from Sweden before playing Switzerland's Yannick Schwaller, another pre-tournament favorite. Olympic Men's Standings - Draw 1 Great Britain (Mouat): 1-0 Canada (Jacobs): 1-0 The United States (Casper): 1-0 Italy (Retornaz): 1-0 Norway (Ramsfjell): 0-0 Switzerland (Schwaller): 0-0 Germany (Muskatewitz): 0-1 Sweden (Edin): 0-1 Czechia (Klima): 0-1 China (Xu): 0-1 |
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Team Joel Retornaz (Photo: Anil Mungal) had the crowd buzzing in Cortina after knocking off Sweden's Niklas Edin.
