Day 2 at the Brier: Alberta's Kevin Koe aims to avoid 'terrible' repeat of 2024 nationals

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Forget last winter, says Kevin Koe. The 2024 Montana’s Brier was simply just one strange event for the 12-time veteran of the Canadian men’s curling championship.

How strange?

Try two-wins-in-eight-games bizarre for a proud guy with four Brier titles to his name.

“Last year was weird,” said Koe, the confusion in his voice underscoring the state of his recall of those nationals in Regina.

“Obviously, we were terrible — our results were terrible,” continued the 50-year-old superstar skip. “I hope it was an aberration. I mean … we were there two years ago, and we had a good week. and we lost the playoffs in a really close game.

“So, hopefully, last year was kind of an asterisk, but we’ll see.”

Indeed, they will in a quest to become the kings of Canada over the 10 days of the Brier.

And that revelation will come quite quickly at this year’s event for Koe and his revamped team, since the early schedule for the Alberta champions is as difficult as any at Prospera Place in Kelowna, B.C.

The Calgary crew, featuring third Aaron Sluchinski — the skip of last year’s Alberta kings — second Tyler Tardi and lead Karrick Martin, opened Friday night with a Draw 1 6-2 loss to No. 1-ranked Matt Dunstone.

Their bid to rebound from last year continued Saturday night with a test against fellow veteran John Epping and his Northern Ontario champs (2-0), but it didn’t go well either in a 9-5 loss. So they went into Sunday with a not-so-hot-start 0-2 record versus another fellow veteran Reid Carruthers and his Manitoba kings (4:30 p.m. ET, TSN).

It’s an oddly demanding opening few days for The Glencoe Club rink, for sure.

“It’s gonna be tough, no matter what,” said Koe, whose pool also features defending three-time Brier champ Brad Gushue and his Canada squad. “All the favourites are in it.

“But if we play like the provincials, I definitely think we’ll definitely improve on last year — and hopefully, we can put a little run together.”

Certainly the provincials last month brought confidence to a foursome in need of some assurances it can challenge for a Brier title.

As the odds-on favourites to win the Alberta playdowns in Stettler, Koe & Co. played like they were just that, running the table at the 2025 Boston Pizza Cup to finish 5-0 in earning the skip’s ninth provincial crown.

That success was relief in many ways for the two-time world champ — not the least of which was proving he’d made the right choice in shedding Jacques Gauthier in favour of Sluchinski in September.

“It was a really good team weekend (at provincials),” declared Koe. “And Aaron fit in really well and has fit in really well and played really good over the week.”

It’s that chemistry which is most important for a skip trying to capture his first national crown since the 2019 Brier.

Especially since they’ve only played a handful of events since Sluchinski, who beat Koe in last year’s provincial final, joined the side early in the campaign.

“We’ve had some ups — we’ve had some downs,” Koe said. “We won a tough spiel before Christmas in Swift Current. We’ve lost a lot of qualifier games to get into the playoffs this year, which are always kind of daggers, because you win a few of those, you’re having a very different season. So we’ve lost some big games that way.

“But you know that winning that one in Swift gave us some confidence, because that was a good field.”

Yes … it was, with nine of the other 17 teams that made the Brier involved in the 2024 RBC Dominion Securities Western Showdown. Including all the big boys — Gushue, Epping, Carruthers, fellow Calgary rink Brad Jacobs and last year’s Brier runner-up, Mike McEwen.

It helped Koe’s crew move up the Canadian Team Ranking System list into a respectable ninth place ahead of the national championship.

“I mean … we’ve lost a lot of big games that if we could have won a couple, our season would look a little better,” added Koe. “So I’m encouraged we’ve had a pretty good run since Aaron’s got on, winning a good spiel and winning provincials.

“I think we’re feeling pretty good for the Brier.”

EXTRA ENDS

Saturday’s Day 2 began with more Nova Scotia magic in Curling Canada’s Season of Champions as Owen Purcell took down Saskatchewan’s Ryan Kleiter (0-1) 7-2 to continue the success laid down by fellow Haligonian Christina Black in her rink’s bronze-medal performance at the Scotties last week … The other Draw 2 scores in the afternoon saw: Alberta’s Jacobs (1-0) bounce Yukon’s Thomas Scoffin (0-1) 10-3; Saskatchewan’s McEwen (1-0) defeat Prince Edward Island’s Tyler Smith (0-1) 6-4; and Ontario’s Sam Mooibroek (1-0) make a magnificent Brier debut with an 11-4 drop of Québec’s Felix Asselin (0-1), thanks to a five count in the second end … Saturday’s late draw also saw: Manitoba’s Dunstone (2-0) dominate Nunavut’s Shane Latimer (0-1) 13-2; Canada’s Gushue (2-0) defeat B.C.’s Cameron de Jong (0-2) 5-3; and Manitoba’s Carruthers (2-0) knock off Newfoundland and Labrador’s Ty Dilello (0-2) 14-2 … The Brier continues with third-day action Sunday — all times ET and all on TSN — in Draw 3 (11:30 a.m.), Draw 4 (4:30 p.m.) and Draw 5 (9:30 p.m.).

tsaelhof@postmedia.com

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