Meet the teams: Team Gushue & Team Fleury

The 2021 Tim Hortons Curling Trials, presented by AGI, will be held Nov. 20-28 at the SaskTel Centre in Saskatoon. Get to know the eventual nine men’s and womens’ teams that will be competing for the right to represent Canada at the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing.

Team Gushue

Could there be a second Winter Olympics gold medal in Brad Gushue’s future?

The Newfoundland and Labrador skip certainly hopes so and it may be tough to bet against the proposition as Gushue and his vice-skip Mark Nichols do carry the distinction of being 2006 Olympic curling champions from the Turin Games.

The two, along with second Brett Gallant and lead Geoff Walker, will be among the nine men’s teams competing for the right to travel to Beijing. Gushue and Nichols were joined by Russ Howard, Jamie Korab and alternate Mike Adam in 2006.

There have been many more triumphs for the popular skip, who has the most games won record at the Tim Hortons Brier, including three Brier championships with this same lineup from 2017, 2018 and 2020. The Gushue crew ran off an impressive 13-0 record in also claiming the 2017 World Championship and the four were silver medallists at Worlds in 2018.

Gushue and Nichol share the distinction of having gold, silver and bronze medals from the Tim Hortons Brier while front-enders Gallant and Walker each have a Brier silver medal.

All four are former Canadian Junior champions and Gushue (1998 and 2001), Nichols (2001) and Walker (2006, 2007) also have World Junior crowns to their name. Gallant – who holds the all-time record for most wins as a skip at the Canadian Junior Curling Championships with 48 – is a World Junior Silver medallist (2009).

Team Gushue – which is coached by Jules Owchar – qualified for the 2021 Tim Hortons Curling Trials by way of its win at the 2020 Tim Hortons Brier.

Team Fleury

It’s been a strong start to the 2021 season for skip Tracy Fleury and her East St. Paul, Man., rink, which got off to a perfect 14-0 record in winning both the Oakville Labour Day Classic and Sherwood Park Women’s Curling Classic.

Fleury, vice-skip Selena Njegovan, second Liz Fyfe and lead Kristin MacCuish hope magic will continue at the 2021 Tim Hortons Curling Trials.

Fleury has skipped at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts four times representing three different provinces or regions, first appearing for Ontario in 2012, then Northern Ontario three years later and Manitoba in 2019, with this very same team. Her other appearance was as Team Northern Ontario with Crystal Webster, Jennifer Wylie and Amanda Gates. 

This current foursome came together after Kerri Einarson shuffled the deck chairs on her team, leaving Njegovan, Fyfe and MacCuish to welcome Fleury as their new skip. MacCuish (twice), Njegovan and Fyfe all have Scotties Tournament of Hearts silver medals to their names.

Njegovan and MacCuish are also former teammates from the 2012 Canadian Juniors in which they finished second, and MacCuish also appeared at the 2013 Scotties Tournament of Hearts as an alternate for Jennifer Jones. Njegovan added a Canadian University crown the next year, while Fyfe won a Canadian Junior title and World Junior bronze medal in 2008.

Fleury’s foursome narrowly missed out in qualifying for the 2021 Scotties Tournament of Hearts, losing 8-7 in the Wild Card play-in game to fellow Manitoban Jennifer Jones. In 2019 Team Fleury shocked Team Einarson 13-7 in the Manitoba Scotties final, bouncing back from an early 5-1 deficit.

Fleury and Co., which is coached by 2013 Canadian Olympic Curling Trials silver medallist Sherry Middaugh, qualified for the 2021 Tim Hortons Trials by way of a top-three CTRS points standing in 2019. 

Tickets for the 2021 Tim Hortons Curling Trials, presented by AGI are available at: https://www.curling.ca/2021trials/tickets/ 

It is important to note that fans above the age of 12 will have to be fully vaccinated against COVID 19 in order to attend Curling Canada-affiliated events. https://www.curling.ca/mandatory-vaccination-policy/