Tough Luck for Saskatchewan

Saskatchewan, skipped by Pat Simmons, played really well throughout the round robin of the 2008 Brier. They certainly deserved their second-place overall standing after the round robin.

In their 1-2 playoff with Alberta (Kevin Martin), Saskatchewan out-curled Alberta by many people's estimation, but had an unlucky sudden curl on Simmons' last rock to lose that game.

In their next round, against Ontario (Glenn Howard), things were a bit different. After blanking the first end, there was a pattern: Saskatchewan would be forced to take one, Howard would take two, etc. until Ontario was up 6-3. Then Simmons made a superb shot after some close misses by Ontario to tie the score at 6. The teams were then forced to trade singles, leaving Ontario with the hammer going into the extra end, which Howard managed to keep clean enough that he could draw successfully for one and the win.

So the final, Sunday at 6:30 on CBC, will be between the two teams that most people were expecting to be there: Ontario and Alberta. This should be a great match.

Overall, the curling has been spectacularly good. Any one of the top four teams could do an excellent job representing Canada at the worlds.