At last year鈥檚 Grand Slam of Curling Canadian Open tournament Team Laycock - comprised of former Yorkton resident and skip Steve Laycock, lead Dallan Muyres, second Colton Flasch and third Kirk Muyres - went on an amazing run in front of family and friends, marching through the qualifiers and playoffs all the way to the final game.
That year the Saskatchewan team posted a record of 5-1 over their first six games with wins over Niklas Edin, Glenn Howard, John Epping, Jim Cotter and Brendan Bottcher before ultimately falling to Brad Gushue 6-5 in the final thanks to a fantastic last shot by the Newfoundland and Labrador skip.
This year, however, things didn鈥檛 go as smoothly for Team Laycock.
An opening match win over B.C.鈥檚 Jim Cotter (6-2) was quickly followed by a pair of tough losses, 5-4 to Scotland鈥檚 David Murdoch due to a missed final shot to drop Team Laycock to the 鈥楤鈥� Event, where they were quickly sent to the 鈥楥鈥� Event following a 7-3 loss to Reid Carruthers (MB).
To get to the playoffs the boys from Saskatchewan had to climb the curling mountain, first taking on the current Brier champion Pat Simmons. A win against Simmons would mean that Laycock and Co. would have to go through the defending Olympic gold medallist - Ontario鈥檚 Brad Jacobs - to qualify for the playoffs.
But Team Laycock did just that, downing Simmons 6-5 in the 鈥楥鈥� Event semi-finals before doing away with Jacobs 7-3 in the last chance qualifier in what was ultimately a route to the playoffs that Laycock says he would have much rather avoided. 鈥淚 have a huge preference to go through 鈥楢鈥� or 鈥楤鈥� and not have to be playing against the wall for the last few games and then have to play early in the morning as well,鈥� stated the Saskatchewan skip, adding that although they had to go through the 鈥楥鈥� Event, he was still proud of the way his team played throughout the competition. 鈥淚鈥檓 really proud of the guys; we needed to finish off the first half of the year with at least a positive showing and making the playoffs in this type of a field is pretty good.鈥�
Unfortunately making the playoffs was the most that Team Laycock accomplished at the Canadian Open as they were immediately ousted in the quarterfinals by the eventual 2015 Canadian Open champion John Epping 6-4, thanks in large part to a horrendous fourth end that saw Laycock give up three points to the Toronot, Ontario-based skip. 鈥淲e really had a bad end in four that kind of put us behind the eight ball a little bit,鈥� offered Laycock on the end that proved to be his team鈥檚 downfall. 鈥淎fter that we needed to get a deuce somewhere or steal a point coming in to the last few ends but they played great and really didn鈥檛 give us anything so full marks to them.鈥�
Laycock then said that he and his team might have advanced past the quarterfinals had they not been a little bit burnt out by their early start to the day. 鈥淥ur first game was at 7:30a.m. today, so it鈥檚 a long day for us,鈥� mentioned Laycock, adding that once the second half of the quarterfinal game began fatigue started to settle in a little bit. 鈥淢aybe initially the fact that we had just come off a win might have been to our benefit, but once again the second half of the game was tough for us.
All in all however, Laycock said that the experience of playing in front of friends and family for the second consecutive year was something that almost made up for the fact that they didn鈥檛 do as well as they did last season. 鈥淚t was fantastic,鈥� suggested Laycock, continuing, 鈥淛ust to see that full building in the quarterfinal was a lot of fun.
鈥淚t gave us a boost of energy that we needed at the start, we鈥檙e just sorry that we didn鈥檛 give them a better show.鈥�
For now, Team Laycock will take a break from curling to focus on the holiday season before returning to the ice on New Year鈥檚 Day to defend their 2015 U.S. Open of Curling title in Blaine, Minnesota.
