Two down, two to go!

Alberta’s Team Jacobs advances to final three at 2025 Montana’s Brier

A lot can change in a year. Twelve months ago, Brad Jacobs and Reid Carruthers were teammates, competing for a chance to win a Canadian men’s curling championship. Saturday at the 2025 Montana’s Brier, presented by AGI, Jacobs and Carruthers were battling to end each other’s paths to a Brier title in order to keep their own alive.

In 2024, the pair advanced to the playoffs but lost both Page qualifying games. This year, in front of a near-capacity crowd of 5,250 curling fans at Prospera Place in Kelowna, B.C., both skips led their teams to the Page 3-4 game, but only one would have the opportunity to advance to the semifinal. 

Jacobs departed Team Carruthers shortly after last year’s Montana’s Brier, and his new team has set lofty goals of becoming the best in the world.

Meanwhile, Team Carruthers reassessed its lineup, bringing in Catlin Schneider at second and adding vice-skip B.J. Neufeld as a late-season a few weeks before the Manitoba championship, bringing new life to the team.

So on Saturday afternoon, something had to give. Alberta’s Team Jacobs of Calgary got the better of Manitoba’s Team Carruthers with a 6-5 win.

Jacobs, vice-skip Marc Kennedy, second Brett Gallant, lead Ben Hebert, alternate Mike Caione and coach Paul Webster are one step closer to the final. They will face the loser of Saturday night’s Page 1-2 game between Canada’s Team Brad Gushue (St. John’s, N.L.) and Manitoba’s Team Matt Dunstone (Winnipeg) at 6:30 p.m. (all times Pacific). 

“It’s been a long time since I’ve played at the Brier on a (closing) Sunday, so we can check that off again, which is nice. I know the guys are super jacked about getting that win and being able to play tomorrow,” said Jacobs. “This was a goal of ours: to get to Sunday at the Brier and we’ve accomplished that. So we’re just going to leave it all out there tomorrow, which is going to be awesome,” Jacobs said, who last played a closing Sunday Brier game in 2016, winning the bronze-medal game.

Tied in the 10th end, Team Jacobs had to make an open hit to score the winning point and eliminate Team Carruthers from the playoffs.

“We had a couple of shots where I feel like I didn’t have my eyes on the sheet quite as well like the last couple games where I knew exactly where the broom needed to go, what the spots in the sheet were doing,” said Carruthers. “Today, there’s a couple shots where I put the broom down and we were getting half shots, where all week we haven’t had that.”

Team Carruthers did battle back late in the game, but not enough to overcome a deficit of three after the seventh end. 

After scoring a single in eight, Team Carruthers got itself back into the equation in the ninth. Team Jacobs attempted a peel on its first skip stone, but ran it back and took its own stone out. Sitting two, Team Carruthers added a third to the house and Alberta could only remove one, leading to a steal of two and tie game heading into the final frame.

“I broke my wrist on one (shot) this week. That’s probably the first really bad throw that I’ve had, but it was also a combination of the ice getting a little bit flat,” Jacobs said. “It almost felt a little bit picky, and as I went to release it, I also just broke my wrist on it. So, my fault, but you know what? My guys made everything in the last end, and we were able to bounce back, even though I threw one up my butt there in nine, and we pulled out the win.”

Team Jacobs awaits the loser of tonight’s Page 1-2 game in Sunday’s semifinal at 11 a.m. Whether Alberta faces Team Dunstone or Team Gushue, Kennedy is prepared.

“We’ve got a lot of faith in one another and know what to say to one another,” said Kennedy. “We’re trying to build a team that can beat the best teams in the country and the world. And we’ve had a really good season, so we feel good and we feel like we’re just continuing to get better as a back end.”

The winner of the semifinal will advance to Sunday’s 5 p.m. gold-medal game.

Sunday’s gold-medallist will represent Canada at the 2025 BKT World Men’s Curling Championship March 29-April 6 in Moose Jaw, Sask.

Live scoring, standings and statistics for the 2025 Montana’s Brier are available at www.curling.ca/scoreboard/.

For ticket information for the 2025 Montana’s Brier, go to www.curling.ca/2025brier/tickets/

This story will be available in French as soon as possible at www.curling.ca/2025brier/nouvelles/?lang=fr