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The final two days of round robin action for Brad Jacobs and his team representing northern Ontario at the 2020 Tim Hortons Brier will be tough.
The Jacobs rink, which includes third Marc Kennedy, second E.J. Harnden, lead Ryan Harnden, and alternate Lee Toner, dropped a 7-6 decision to Newfoundland and Labrador’s Brad Gushue on Monday night.
The loss drops Team Northern Ontario to 1-3 in the nine-day event with three round robin games to go.
Jacobs jumped out to an early lead by scoring four with the hammer in the opening end.
Gushue got on the board in the second with three to cut into the lead.
After Jacobs went up 5-3 in the third, Gushue blanked the fourth end before tying the game with two in the fifth.
Jacobs blanked the sixth and seventh ends before taking the lead with a single in the eighth end.
The Gushue rink then blanked the ninth and scored a pair in the tenth to pick up the win and move to 3-1.
The Jacobs rink returns to action with a pair of games on Tuesday.
The team will face Quebec’s Alek Bedard in the afternoon draw before wrapping up the day against Nova Scotia’s Jamie Murphy in the evening draw.
Jacobs will wrap up round robin action on Wednesday against Nunavut’s Jake Higgs.
The nine-day event features 16 teams divided into two pools and will see the round robin conclude on Wednesday evening.
The top four teams in each pool will advance to the Championship Pool, which begins on Thursday afternoon with teams carrying over their round robin records into the pool.
Following two days of Championship Pool action, the top four teams will advance to the playoff round.
Page Playoff action begins on Saturday afternoon with the semifinal set for Sunday afternoon and the tournament final to follow on Sunday evening.