HALIFAX — About 24 hours after Matt Dunstone thought he was out of it completely, the skipper slid down the Scotiabank Centre ice waving at fans with a smile on his face, just two wins away from an Olympic berth.
On Thursday night, Dunstone and his Winnipeg team of third Colton Lott and E.J. and Ryan Harnden earned a 9-5 win over Saskatchewan’s Mike McEwen in the semifinal, which buys them the chance to meet Brad Jacobs in a best-of-three for all the marbles, starting Friday night.
“It’s been emotional,” the 30-year-old Dunstone said when it was over. “The lowest of lows to, you know, having a chance and then trying to turn game mode back on.”
It’s been a heck of a range of emotion for this team in the last day: They thought they were out completely Wednesday after McEwen beat them in just eight ends, and Dunstone and the Harnden brothers stormed off the ice when it was over, needing losses from both Brad Gushue and Kevin Koe in their round robin finales to squeak in and nab the last playoff berth. Most of their team brought all their curling gear back to the hotel, convinced they wouldn’t need it again here.
Then both of those losses came, and so Dunstone, Lott and the Harnden brothers navigated devastation to elation in a matter of minutes.
“Curling gods gifted us one yesterday, gave us this opportunity. You don’t wanna pass up on these opportunities, and we didn’t,” Dunstone said. “Just really proud of the group.”
As McEwen put it: “They got a second life and they came out and they played like a different team today.”
It was a different Dunstone on the ice Thursday. He pumped his fist, tossed his broom in the air in celebration, and played with the confidence he’s shown for much of the season that has seen his team earn a world No. 2 ranking and crack every Grand Slam final to date.
“A lot of the emotions that you could have felt losing this game were out yesterday,” Dunstone explained. “It was very easy to play completely free tonight, having already felt that. And just being provided the second chance — I want to show a lot of gratitude, actually, towards this opportunity. It would have been very easy to argue that we shouldn’t have had it, shouldn’t have been here today. And we happen to be, so I just really wanted to appreciate the moment.”
Dunstone not only appreciated it, he made the most of it. The skipper curled 92 per cent in the winning effort, and though McEwen, Colton Flasch and Kevin and Daniel Marsh curled exceptionally well, Dunstone was able to capitalize on a couple of errors to break the game open.
The first came in the sixth end when McEwen was curling above 90 per cent, but sent an attempted freeze in heavy with his last, leaving Dunstone with a shot at three. Dunstone navigated past a pair of guards to give his team a 6-4 lead before tossing that broom in the air while Lott and the Harnden brothers pumped their fists in the house.
In nine, McEwen floated in his final to sit shot rock, but that left Dunstone with a tap for two, and the Winnipeg team took an 8-5 lead into the final end.
And then the 10th end was a doozy — “it was wild,” as Lott put it. McEwen nearly had a shot for the win, had Dunstone’s last draw not floated in and buried the way it did.
The result few saw coming 24 hours ago is a first-ever Olympic Trials final for Dunstone, the 30-year-old skipper who’s a two-time silver medallist at the Brier, including earlier this year. Team Dunstone lost that final to Team Jacobs.
“I think we’re more than ready,” Lott said, to earn the right to represent Canada on the biggest stage.
“Obviously we have to curl at a very high level,” Dunstone said. “We gotta put a ton of pressure on them. Ultimately that’s what it comes down to.”
And what you can count on, if you ask Dunstone, is you’ll be seeing that same light and free approach he played with Thursday through the final.
“Absolutely,” the skip said. “Every game from here on out is house money.”
