Team Jacobs bounces back at National

Sault Ste. Marie’s Brad Jacobs rebounded from a loss in a big way on Thursday at the National, the latest Grand Slam of Curling event, happening this week in Conception Bay South, Nfld.

After losing its tournament opener to Brendan Bottcher of Edmonton on Wednesday, the Jacobs rink, which includes third Marc Kennedy, second E.J. Harnden, and lead Ryan Harnden, picked up a pair of wins on Thursday to move to 2-1 at the six-day event.

Jacobs opened the day with a 5-1 win over Yannick Schwaller of Bern, Switzerland in the morning draw.

After Schwaller blanked the opening end, Jacobs took the lead with a steal of one in the second end before stealing one more in the third end to increase the lead.

Schwaller got on the board with a single in the fourth end.

After blanking the fifth end, Jacobs took a 4-1 lead with a pair in the sixth and capped off the win with a steal of one in the seventh.

Later in the day, Jacobs picked up a 4-2 win over Niklas Eden of Sweden.

After Edin scored with the hammer in the opening end to take a 1-0 lead, Jacobs scored a pair in the second end to go ahead.

The teams traded singles in the following two ends, giving Jacobs a 3-2 lead heading into the fifth end.

Edin would blank three consecutive ends to have the hammer in the eighth.

Looking for a pair in the end, Edin would eventually give up a steal of one in the end to make the final 4-2.

In an interview with TheGrandSlamOfCurling.com’s Jonathan Brazeau, Kennedy spoke of how the Jacobs rink recovered from the loss to Bottcher.

“We had a tough first game against Bottcher, but we’ve regrouped pretty well,” Kennedy said following the win over Edin. “We battled some challenging ice conditions but managed to make some big shots later in the game. Always good to beat those guys. They’re tough.”

The Jacobs rink wraps up round robin action on Friday night in the final draw of the day against Yuta Matsumura of Sapporo, Japan.

The playoff round begins with quarterfinal action on Saturday and the men’s and women’s finals on Sunday.

The tournament features 15 men’s and 15 women’s teams split into three pools of five teams. The top eight teams after the completion of the round robin advance to the playoff round.