The Brad Jacobs rink out of Sault Ste. Marie dominated the Northern Ontario Provincial Men's Championships and that continued today in the final.
Jacobs pounced early with a chance for three in first, but ended up scoring two with the hammer. In the end it didn’t matter, as the defending champs never looked back, winning the title 5-0 over Jordan Chandler of the Sudbury Curling Club.
“We know what our chances are like when we score two or three in the first end, even if we score one point really. It’s important for us to get a lead. We were able to do that in this game and this week, especially the last four or five games and we were able to run away with some easy wins.”
Some miscues by the chandler rink, forced them to blank the second end and with nothing going for them in the third, they kept hammer going into the fifth. There the Sudbury rink had the door wide open to secure two. However, consecutive takeouts by Jacobs, kept it a 2-0 score. Chandler admits that missed opportunities proved costly in the end.
“We’re very disappointed, not at the result, but in the way we played, probably not our sharpest game of the week. Our communication was a little off and they just weren’t missing anything,”
With a 3-0 lead going into the eight, Jacobs was lying four and Chandler could not pull the trigger allowing a steal of two for Jacobs and soon the customary handshakes signaling an end to the game.
“We got fortunate in the fifth when they had a great end set up. We made two good ones on my last and got a break when they tried the double and blank and missed and from there it was like, let’s just keep control of this game and finish it off and I am really proud of the guys with the way they played,” shared Jacobs.
Despite cruising for most of the week, Jacobs admits he was nervous heading into Sundays final.
“Chandler’s team didn’t surprise us. We predicted that if we played well and made it to the final, we would be playing them. It was absolutely no surprise they made it as far as they did, they’re a great team. They’ve been curling a lot of years and if you don’t bring you’re “A” game and perform well, they can get you.”
For the Jacobs rink, this will be their eighth Brier appearance, with the winner qualifying for the 2018 Olympics trials. The defending Olympic champion Skip says his team won’t be taking a break till they begin play in Ottawa next month.
“We’re really going to train hard. We’re going to be in the gym every day, on the ice every day and working extremely hard just to get that much sharper, that much more precise on everything that we do. Going through the play downs is a building process and you want to continue getting better each game and we definitely have little room for improvement as a team going into the brier and we will work on any of the kinks that we have and give it all we got in Ottawa.”
