LETHBRIDGE, Alta. – Brad Gushue and Colton Flasch put on a show Saturday afternoon in front of an electric crowd at Enmax Centre. 

The skips traded highlight reel shots in just about every end during their 3 vs. 4 page playoff clash at the Tim Hortons Brier, highlighted by Gushue’s angle raise takeout winner in the 10th to score three and the 9-7 win. 

After making the winner, Gushue emphatically pumped his fist in celebration and told the crowd to get even louder, a good indication of how difficult the win was for his rink. 

“To win a Brier playoff game with three players, it’s pretty impressive,” Gushue told the media after shooting 80 per cent, impressive given the difficulty of some of the shots he was facing.  

Gushue’s rink out of St. John’s are playing one man down after veteran third Mark Nichols received a positive COVID-19 test on Friday, knocking him out for the rest of the tournament. It will be Gushue, Brett Gallant and Geoff Walker the rest of the way with Nichols showing his support via Twitter as he did Saturday afternoon. 

Gushue described the loss of Nichols as a “gut punch on top of a kick in the groin” after entering the playoffs with a perfect 8-0 round robin record. A loss to the defending champs led by Brendan Bottcher in the page seeding round forced them into the 3 vs. 4 game against Saskatchewan on Saturday.

The 41-year-old skip says competing against elite level teams as a trio is like playing a hockey game while killing a penalty for 60 minutes. It makes it that much harder when you’re losing a curler of Nichols’ calibre.  

“It is that big of a difference in my opinion. You don’t have two guys sweeping, you don’t have the ability to steer the rock the way we can. Like hold it straight or carve it,” Gushue said. “I got two really good mixed doubles players that can shift around, but it’s still not the same. Obviously, we’ve lost arguably our best shooter. Not having Mark in there, as good as Brett and Geoff are, no disrespect to them, or as little disrespect as possible, they’re not Mark Nichols.”

Gallant, the second on the team who is now shooting three stones every end with Nichols out, says playing the three-man game is actually more demanding on the mental side of things than the physical. 

“You have to fight the feeling that you need to be more precise on your throws when you only have one sweeper,” he said. “I think playing a lot of mixed doubles has helped with that.” 

Both Gallant and Walker have played the mixed doubles discipline for years which has helped them to acclimate to the tough situation they find themselves in. 

“We’re a lot more comfortable with it now than we would have been eight years ago before mixed doubles came into the fray,” Gallant explained.  

Despite being thrilled with Saturday’s win over Saskatchewan, Gushue knows the next test will only get tougher. They’ll take on Bottcher in the semi-final Sunday afternoon after he dropped a 9-6 decision to Alberta's Kevin Koe in the 1 vs. 2 game. 

“Our odds of winning this thing without Mark went down from a very high percentage to a very, very low percentage,” said Gushue. “We’re realistic about what’s going to happen tomorrow. We’re going to have to play spectacular and probably need some uncharacteristic misses because we don’t have the ability to be as precise as we normally do when we have four guys out there.”

Gushue says the team’s No. 1 priority is to make sure Nichols has everything he needs because there’s a good chance he’ll be calling a Lethbridge hotel room his home for the next few days. 

Trying to keep everything in perspective is key as well, says the 2017 world champion. 

“Even though it’s a sh*tty situation, there’s a lot worse situations in the world right now. So, he’s [Nichols] going to come through this in the next few days and win or lose here we’re going to grind it out until the end and see what happens,” said Gushue. “I think that’s helped, but I won’t lie, it’s been a challenge. As much perspective as you have and as much as you try to think about it the right way, it still sucks to be playing so well and have arguably your best player go down.” 

If anybody can find a way to get it done with three players, it’s probably Team Gushue. The Newfoundlanders have won three Brier Tankards since 2017 and are fresh off winning a bronze medal at the Winter Olympics just last month. 

By the time they arrived in Lethbridge, the Olympic exhaustion was still with them, and they said their expectations for this year’s Brier were lower compared to other years. Then they ran the table in the preliminary round.  

“There’s no quit in our team and I think we’ve proven that over the last eight or 10 years we’ve been together. This afternoon was no exception. Super proud of what we did,” said Gushue.  

Gallant says this team is capable of anything. 

“If we look in the mirror, we’re all talented players,” said the 32-year-old. “We can sweep, and we can throw. Geoff is great in the house as well. We’re not out of this yet. Yeah, it’s going to be tough, but we still have to believe in ourselves.”