MOOSE JAW -- To say the least, Sweden’s Niklas Edin has been here and done that in the BKT World Men’s Curling Championship,
And with more success than anyone on the planet at this point.
So seeing the defending world champion rebound from a tough loss to China on the opening day of the competition is absolutely no surprise -- and with two wins on Sunday, Edin is right back in the hunt.
Edin and his rink of third Oscar Eriksson, second Rasmus Wranaa and lead Christoffer Sundgren capped their day with an 8-4 win over Austria’s Mathias Genner during Draw 5 at the tournament taking place at Temple Gardens Centre in Moose Jaw.
“I felt like we played okay, I didn't have my best game and it's a long week, so we kind of know that we can't waste our energy trying to play 100% all the time,” Edin said after what turned into a surprisingly close game. “We definitely had to fight a little bit to get back in this game, but it’s a good win still.”
Genner, third Jonas Backofen, second Martin Reichel and lead Florian Mavec came into the contest coming off of two tough losses, but gave Sweden everything they had and found themselves tied 3-3 after six ends. Edin took control of the game with a pair in the seventh, though, and after holding Genner to one in the eighth, scored three in the ninth for the comfortable-looking win.
Not a bad showing at all for an Austria team nearly 100 places lower in the world rankings heading into tournament, with Edin 13th overall and Genner 111th.
Still, with Sweden putting their winning experience to good use -- Edin has won the title seven times in the last 12 years, including five of the last six -- there’s little question the plan could come together very, very quickly.
“In 12 games we know we've got to win more than we lose and I think we're still kind of on a good note,” Edin said. “Losing to China, obviously they're playing really well and beating everyone so far, so maybe not as bad a start as we thought it was, but I think we were really happy with the win this morning (a 10-5 victory over Japan). Tonight it was just getting the win that was important and if we can play like we did this morning, I think we're in good shape.”
The goal will be to keep things moving at a steady and positive pace, get into the playoffs and throw things into full gear when the time is right,
“We're one of the more experienced teams out there and we know we can do it, so it's more about playing well enough and getting the wins early and we're going to try to step it up,” Edin said. “I think we're on track so far, we just need to get a few more good games behind us.”
Other results from Draw 5 saw Norway (Magnus Ramsfjell) take an 8-3 win over Germany (Marc Muskatewitz) in seven ends, China (Xiaoming Xu) defeat Italy (Joel Retonaz) 9-4 and Scotland (Bruce Mouat) roll to a 9-3 win over Korea (Hyojin Kim).
Standings after the first two days of competition are as follows
Canada (Jacobs) 3-0
China (Xu) 3-0
Scotland (Mouat) 3-0
Czechia (Klima) 2-1
Norway (Ramsfjell) 2-1
Switzerland (Schwaller) 2-1
Sweden (Edin) 2-1
United States (Dropkin) 2-1
Italy (Retornaz) 1-2
Austria (Genner) 0-3
Japan (Yamaguchi) 0-3
Korea (Kim) 0-3
Be sure to check out for the full schedule and up-to-the-minute scores and standings.
