Sault brothers battle in Brier final

It was a battle of brothers in the final of the 2023 Tim Hortons Brier on Sunday evening in London, Ont.

Brad Gushue and his team from Newfoundland and Labrador, in the event as team Canada faced Manitoba’s Matt Dunstone in the final on Sunday with brothers E.J. Harnden (Team Gushue) and Ryan Harnden (Team Dunstone) facing off for a Canadian title.

In the end, a draw by Gushue in the 10th end sealed a 7-5 victory and a fifth Canadian title for the east-coast team, which welcomed E.J. on during the off-season.

FOR THE WIN!!!!! @TeamGushue #Brier2023 pic.twitter.com/UjEwwWXEgO

— Curling Canada (@CurlingCanada) March 13, 2023

Speaking to Curling Canada following the win, E.J. called winning “amazing.”

“It’s been 10 years, a lot of time and effort and heartache, just so many emotions,” E.J. said. “Doing it with a new team against my brother, I think I’m cried out now, which is great, but I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way. If Ryan and I were going to be on different teams, I loved this scenario, as hard as it was for one of us to win and know that if it wasn’t me, it was going to be him.”

E.J. received plenty of praise from Gushue following the game.

“He’s one of the best seconds in the world and has been for a long time and brings a different skillset to our team,” Gushue said of E.J. in an interview with TSN following the win. “It’s fun playing with him. I’ve roomed with him all year. It’s been a blast.”

Asked in the post-game media scrum about his fifth Brier title, Gushue called it a “team win.”

“It’s cool, but to be honest, I’m more excited, when E.J. came onto the team, he wanted to get this again, this Brier,” Gushue said. “They had so many close runs when he played with Brad Jacobs and to finish it off and get it for him and obviously for myself Mark and Geoff to get five it’s pretty awesome.”

The Gushue rink includes a second Sault tie in Caleb Flaxey, who has joined the team as a coach this season.

After Gushue blanked the opening end, the teams traded singles until Gushue opened up a 6-3 lead thanks to three in the eighth end. Dunstone would cut the lead back to one with a pair in the ninth end before Gushue sealed the win in the final end.

The Gushue rink went 7-1 in pool play before beating Mike McEwen’s Ontario rink 9-3 to earn a spot in the 1/2 page playoff game where they would face Dunstone. Gushue scored one in the 10th end to over Dunstone to earn a spot directly into Sunday’s final and send the Dunstone rink to the semi-final against Bottcher, a game they would win 7-5 to get a rematch with Gushue.

A picture says a thousand words. 💛 ❤️ pic.twitter.com/eF7Y9CHvCU

— Curling Canada (@CurlingCanada) March 13, 2023

It was a year ago that E.J. and Ryan were in the event as teammates on Team Northern Ontario at the event along with longtime teammate Brad Jacobs at skip and Marc Kennedy at third.

The Jacobs team broke up at the end of the season with Jacobs stepping away from competitive men’s curling, though he has returned for a handful of Grand Slam of Curling events this season with Reid Carruthers and also competed in the provincial playdowns for northern Ontario.

Kennedy joined Brenden Bottcher’s newly-formed team in the off-season and the Bottcher rink finished third after a semi-final loss to Dunstone.