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Jacobs facing must-win situation (9 photos)

Sault Ste. Marie’s Brad Jacobs fell to 1-2 at Grand Slam of Curling event being held locally on Thursday afternoon. Jacobs dropped a 5-4 decision in an extra end to Adam Casey’s rink from P.E.I.

Sault Ste. Marie’s Brad Jacobs fell to 1-2 at Grand Slam of Curling event being held locally on Thursday afternoon.

Jacobs dropped a 5-4 decision in an extra end to Adam Casey’s rink from P.E.I. in draw three action Thursday afternoon before dropping a 5-4 decision to Glenn Howard in the evening draw at The National.

“We played pretty terrible all day,” Jacobs said of the losses. “We’ve just got to refocus and come out with more intensity tomorrow than we had today.”

Jacobs forced the extra end against Casey with a takeout of a Casey stone buried deep in the house in the eighth end.

Casey would pick up the win with his final shot of the extra end. Facing a pair of Jacobs rocks, Casey drew for one and the win.

Against Howard in the evening draw, the Jacobs rink found themselves tied at two before Howard scored a pair in the fifth end. Howard picked up the win with a single point in the eighth end after Jacobs stole one in the seventh end to tie things up at four.

With a 1-2 record heading into the final day of the round robin on Friday, the Jacobs rink is forced to win both games, against Matthew Blandford and John Epping to have a shot of advancing to the playoff round.

“Our backs are against the wall as usual and we can’t afford any more losses if we want to qualify (for the playoffs),” Jacobs said. “Tomorrow we’re going to have to play a lot better than we did today.”

In the morning draw on Thursday Epping beat Blandford 7-5 in an extra end. Blandford scored single points in the final three ends to force the extra.

In a battle of the two American teams in the event, Heath McCormick beat John Shuster 6-5 in an extra end. McCormick forced the extra end with steals in the final two ends before a steal of one in the extra end to pick up the win.

Steve Laycock picked up a 7-2 win over John Morris in seven ends while Brendan Bottcher beat Brad Gushue 7-4 and Reid Carruthers picked up a 6-1 five-end win over Rob Rumfeldt.

In other draw three action, Shuster beat Laycock 8-7; Brandon Bottcher beat Kevin Koe 6-4; Carruthers beat Peter De Cruz 9-3 in five ends and Howard stole two in the eighth end to beat Mark Kean 6-5.

Draw four saw Gushue beat Renfeldt 8-3; Blandford beat Kean 5-4; McCorcmick beat Morris 5-4; Epping beat Casey 5-4 in an extra end while Mike McEwen scored a pair in an extra end to beat Jeff Stoughton 7-5.

The other scores in draw five included Carruthers beating Koe 5-4, Bottcher beating De Cruz 7-5, Morris beating McEwen 7-3 and Stoughton beat Laycock 7-6.

The round robin wraps up with four draws on Friday.

(PHOTO: L-R Skips Glenn Howard and Brad Jacobs seen during draw 5 against on November 20, 2014 at the Essar Centre. Kenneth Armstrong/SooToday)


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Brad Coccimiglio

About the Author: Brad Coccimiglio

A graduate of Loyalist College’s Sports Journalism program, Brad Coccimiglio’s work has appeared in The Hockey News as well as online at FoxSports.com in addition to regular freelance work with SooToday before joining the team full time.
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