THUNDER BAY – Normally, when a two-time world champion skip has been missing in action, things don’t always go well for the rest of the team.
Most other teams don’t have a back-up skip like Frank Morissette.
The 72-year-old curler has been nothing short of spectacular filling in this season for Al Hackner, who’s spent much of the fall south of the border, coaching the next generation of American curlers.
All Morissette has led the Hackner-less foursome, that includes Jonah Dupuis, Rob Sinclair and Gary Champagne, to a 5-2-2-0 record, the latest win a 6-3 decision over former two-time Tbaytel Major League of Curling champion Dylan Johnston.
The triumph vaulted the squad into a tie for second place, with Krista McCarville’s team, at 19 points, a single point back of Major League of Curling Leader Trevor Bonot.
“We’ve had a consistent season so far. We’ve played well, pretty much, in every game. We’ve lost two, but the rest of the games we’ve played really well and things are going well,” Morissette said after Wednesday night’s triumph at the Port Arthur Curling Club.
Hackner or not, Morissette said familiarity with each other goes a long way.
“We’ve all played together a long time. This is the first year I’ve played with Jonah and he’s playing really, really great,” Morissette said.
“Everybody’s playing well, so that’s the key to the game.”
The turning point against Johnston, off to an uncharacteristically slow start at 3-1-5-0, was a steal of three in the fifth, upping the Morissette team’s lead to 6-1.
“I don’t know if his rocks were a little bit different, one might have been quicker than the other,” Morissette said.
“They were laying one and then they picked one out and all of a sudden we were lying two, buried. That was a big change, a big break for us with that shot there.”
Asked if they needed Hackner, who could play on Thursday night when the Major League makes up for a postponed Week 1, Morissette, who played for Alberta at the 1976 Brier, cackled.
“So far, not yet,” he said.
McCarville’s match didn’t take long to take shape.
The two-time Scotties Tournament of Hearts runner-up stole four in the first end and shook hands after the fourth, downing Robyn Despins 7-1 to up her record to 5-2-2.
“She had a draw on her last one and it’s tough when you have to take a little bit more ice in the first end. It could be quick out there, it could be heavier out there. Fortunately for us it was heavier out there and she didn’t throw it heavier. If she’d gotten inside the path a little bit, then it would have been a little bit quicker for her and she would have made the shot,” McCarville said.
With six games left in the regular season, just nine points separates first from 12th. Every point matters at this stage, McCarville said.
“We’ve been crawling back. We started out pretty good, then we kind of went downhill for a few games. We’ve kind of made a little bit of a comeback the last four or five games, that we’ve won. But we’ve got to keep going,” she said.
Nineteen-year-old Jackson Dubinsky is on the outside of the championship round at the moment, but helped his cause with a thrilling 7-5 win over Bryan Burgess, who led the Major League of Curling standings heading into Wednesday night.
Dubinsky scored three in the seventh to take a 6-5 lead, then stole one in the eighth to eke out a 7-5 win, Burgess missing a chance for a double and a win of his own.
“It was definitely down to the wire. Bryan made everything that game, so we got a little bit lucky at the end. But we’ll take it. You need a little luck,” Dubinsky said.
In other action, Chris Silver downed Denis Malette 5-2, Brian Adams Jr. needed five ends to beat Jodi Judd 7-2, Trevor Bonot survived a tight one with Ben Mikkelson, winning 6-5 after trailing 4-0 early, Ron Rosengren scored five in the seventh to take out Andrew Sinclair 8-3 and Gary Weiss knocked off Zach Warkentin 7-2.
