Takeaways: Strong communication leads to two-win day for Canada at curling worlds

The panic level is going down for Canadian curling fans.

After two straight losses at the world men’s championship, Matt Dunstone’s Manitoba-based rink rebounded in a big way on Monday with 9-2 and 8-3 wins over Poland and Japan, respectively. Canada is now 4-2 and tied for third place in the 13-team round-robin in Ogden, Utah.

Despite the Polish and Japanese programs on the men’s side being nowhere near as good as the Canadian rink, both teams gave the Canucks a run for their money.

The fourth-stone throwers for both countries seemed like they couldn’t miss, leading to the games being close at the fifth-end break. Canada led Poland 4-2, and was up 3-2 on Japan.

But Poland and Japan just couldn’t keep up down the stretch with the Canadians, who seemed to gain confidence as each game went on.

For Canada, the biggest momentum boost came in the seventh end against Japan. The game was tied 3-3 and Dunstone could’ve played an open draw for two. 

Instead, the skipper called for a runback attempt to try to score four. He made it with ease, blowing the game wide open. 

“I think we’ve been looking for a little bit of a spark to kind of get us going and that was an opportunity to do that,” Dunstone told reporters after the win against Japan. “We were all over them for most of that game and just couldn’t get that multiple score on the board to take more than a one-point lead and that was our opportunity.”

Dunstone knows Monday was a huge step in the right direction.

“For us, especially coming off two pretty bad losses, I mean it was time for us to look inwards and do a little bit of soul searching and worry about us,” Dunstone told reporters following the morning win against Poland. “We know if we play well, we have a good chance to win every single game that we play here and we hadn’t done that the last 48 hours.”

The Canadians will need to continue their better play on Tuesday as they face China (3-3) in the morning before battling seven-time world champ Niklas Edin (7-0) of Sweden in the evening.

Communication drives success for Canada

When Dunstone and teammates Colton Lott, E.J. Harnden and Ryan Harnden got thumped on back-to-back days by Scotland and the U.S., it wasn’t because they weren’t making shots. 

The lack of communication the Canadians had once they got down was the biggest problem. They weren’t talking their shots through like we normally see, and Dunstone wasn’t really using the information being relayed.

On Monday, however, things were much better.

Throughout both games, all four members had good communication — especially Dunstone. The skip was not only believing what he was seeing in terms of curl and how the sheet was reacting to different paths, but also was using the information being told to him.

As a result, even though Poland and Japan played Canada really tight in the first halves, the matches never felt in doubt for the Canadian rink.

Host nation right in the thick of it 

Even though John Shuster has represented the U.S. 12 times at the worlds, this is only the second occasion in which he’s been the home team. The last time came back in 2006, when the event was in Lowell, Mass., and Shuster was 23 years old playing lead for Pete Fenson. 

Needless to say, a lot has changed in 20 years. 

Shuster is now looked at as an American curling hero for skipping the country to its first Olympic gold medal in 2018. The 10-time national champion also earned a bronze medal at the 2016 worlds.

So far, it’s been an up-and-down bonspiel for Shuster and his teammates Chris Plys, Colin Hufman and Matt Hamilton, who are 3-3 and tied for seventh place in the standings. 

However, it seems to be trending upwards for the host nation after Monday’s outing against Japan. The Americans won 9-2, curling 86 per cent as a team in front of a supportive crowd. 

Shuster believes his team has been improving with each game.  

“I think we’ve kind of been trying to build the whole time and I think these last three games are much more us than the first three were,” Shuster told reporters.

If the U.S. wants to make the playoffs, the team might need to win five of its last six round-robin games. However, the U.S. already has played medal contenders Canada, Sweden and Scotland.

Scots win fourth straight game

We’re starting to see how good this Scottish team led by skip Ross Whyte really is. 

Since starting 0-2, in which the team curled 85 and 87 per cent respectively, the Scots have rattled off four consecutive wins, including a 9-3 victory over Italy on Monday. 

The game was decided in the fourth end when Whyte made a hit — his bread-and-butter shot — through a super tight port to score five. 

In all four games during the win streak, the team has curled at least 90 per cent.

Scotland looks very comfortable. Every shot seems routine, they’re never in trouble, and it’s like they’re putting on a clinic. 

Japan makes innocent mistake 

Sometimes you just have to laugh at yourself, like Japan’s skip Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi did on Monday night.  

In the fourth end, the skipper went to throw a simple hit to take out the red Canadian stone sitting in the house. 

However, the stone Yamaguchi hit the Canadian rock with was also red. A simple but funny mistake, that had everyone on the ice laughing. 

They replaced the stone with the correct colour (yellow) and continued play, but Yamaguchi felt so bad he said sorry several times afterward.

Even the pros forget what colour they’re supposed to throw sometimes.