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Marc Kennedy calls it the Brad Gushue Effect.  

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“He’s been absolutely dominant and the teams under him are going to do everything they can to try to beat him,” two-time Olympian Kennedy said Tuesday. 

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“We felt we had to do something in order to accomplish that.” 

As such, one of Canada’s premier men’s curling teams dropped a major bombshell, announcing that 2021 Brier-winning skip Brendan Bottcher is now looking for new teammates, just 18 months before the Olympic curling trials. 

“Definitely a bombshell and a tough couple days for everyone,” Kennedy said from his home near Edmonton. “Brendan was a fantastic teammate and a good friend and it wasn’t specifically anything that happened. There wasn’t a moment.  

“It’s just that we put our team together to try to win some big stuff. A couple of us are on a bit of a time constraint here when it comes to our careers and we just had to ask ourselves ‘Is this the current line-up that’s going to go out there and win some big championships.’ We had some question marks.” 

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Gushue, who curls out of St. John’s, N.L., has won the Brier six times in the last eight years and has taken the last three straight. His team also won the Olympic trials in 2021. 

Team Bottcher finished third at the Montana’s Brier this year in Regina with a lineup that included Kennedy at third, Brett Gallant at second and Ben Hebert at lead. Those three players, along with coach Paul Webster, will be moving forward without Bottcher, who has been one of the top skips in the country for the last eight years.  

Kennedy said the team hopes to announce a new skip within the next 72 hours.  

“We knew that if we were going to make a change or make a decision on a new line-up, it had to be quick,” Kennedy said. “We had to have some tough conversations and here we are, all with the goal of trying to win some big stuff.” 

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Several curling sources said the front-runner for the job is Brad Jacobs, who threw skip stones for team Reid Carruthers out of Winnipeg this season. Jacobs won an Olympic gold medal in 2014 and has been a strong contender at the Brier, mostly representing Northern Ontario, for many years.  

There is also uncertainty about the future of 49-year-old Kevin Koe and his Alberta-based team, which includes Tyler Tardi, Jacques Gauthier and Karrick Martin. Should Koe choose to step back after his team’s disastrous performance at the 2024 Brier, that could be a soft landing spot for Bottcher.  

Alberta’s Team Aaron Sluchinski also posted on social media Tuesday that a player announcement is coming soon. Sluchinski beat Koe for the Alberta provincial championship this season.  

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“We are not going to be the only domino to fall,” Kennedy said. “That’s the impact that Brad Gushue’s team has had on Canadian curling. It’s forcing teams every year to re-think where they are, re-think where they’re trying to get to and whether they’re willing to make the hard decisions in order to compete with him.  

“That’s a really unique thing in our sport that we haven’t seen before. It’s like a Roger Federer situation right now. We don’t want to be status quo and we’re not the only team that feels like that right now, so there will be some changes.” 

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Team Bottcher just completed its second season as a foursome. The team was formed after the 2022 Olympics with a goal of not only winning Canada but putting the country back on the top of the international curling scene.  

With two-time Olympians and 2010 gold medallists Kennedy and Hebert on board, along with 2022 Olympic bronze medallist Gallant, the team looked like an absolute powerhouse on paper. 

But, on paper doesn’t always translate into results on the ice.  

“We’re not the easiest team to lead,” Kennedy said. “That’s a big part of it too. We’ve got some big personalities and it takes a special person to be a leader for Brett, Ben and myself, with what we’ve been through in our accomplishments. 

“Brendan is an incredible curler and he’s going to win a ton of stuff. His trajectory is upwards and I wouldn’t be surprised if he becomes one of the best curlers this country has ever seen. But is it on that timeline of the next 18 months? I don’t know. There are some things to work on.” 

The team won two Grand Slam titles during its time together (2023 Canadian Open, 2023 Champions Cup) and rose to the top of the CTRS standings this season.  

The team has already earned one of three wild-card spots in the 2025 Montana’s Brier and will keep that spot even with a different skip.  

The Olympic curling trials are slated to be played in late November of 2025 in Halifax. The winner will represent Canada at the Olympic Winter Games in Milan, Italy, in February of 2026.  

Twyman@postmedia.com 

X.com/Ted_Wyman 

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