Lynnwood’s Clark eliminated in semifinals of curling nationals

Published 1:30 am Friday, February 17, 2017

EVERETT — Home-ice advantage wasn’t enough for Lynnwood’s Brady Clark.

Clark’s quest for a second consecutive men’s national title came up just short as he fell 8-5 to Todd Birr in the semifinal of the USA Curling National Championships on Friday night at Xfinity Arena.

Nationals being in Everett gave Clark the rare opportunity to play a major event in front of his hometown fans, who provided boisterous support all week. But they couldn’t help pull Clark over the line Friday.

“We had great support, we had a lot of people out here cheering us on,” Clark said. “We followed our routine, I think we put ourselves in position, just things didn’t go our way. We at least finished in the top three. It could have been worse, but definitely disappointed.”

Clark, who skipped teams to championships in 2013 and 2016, entered the day with a chance of advancing straight to the final, having finished second in round-robin play. However, his team fell 6-4 to top-seeded John Shuster in the morning’s page playoffs, knocking Team Clark into the semifinal while Team Shuster advanced straight to the final.

Then in the semifinal Clark was in good shape against Team Birr, leading 3-2 in the fourth end and in position to force Birr to settle for one point when holding the hammer. However Clark, needing a simple takeout with his last stone, instead nudged a Birr guard into the rings, giving Birr an open draw to score three. Birr made the draw to go ahead 5-3, and after that Team Birr played nearly perfect, never allowing an opening for Team Clark to get back into the contest.

“I missed a big shot in the fourth end and cost us the game, to be honest,” Clark said. “We played well enough to keep ourselves in there. I think Birr’s team played fantastic. Hats off to them, they played well. I’m disappointed, obviously, that I just didn’t have my A game, missed a couple critical shots and cost us the game.”

Team Birr ended up outcurling Team Clark 87 percent to 83 percent, with Team Birr second John Benton curling an astounding 98 percent.

“We played a lot crisper than we did this morning (when defeating Craig Brown 7-6 in the 3-4 page playoff game),” said Birr, who is looking to add to the national championship he won in 2007. “We got a big break for that three, and from there we kind of put our ears back and controlled the game the rest of the way.”

Team Birr, the third seed, advanced to face Team Shuster in the finals. Shuster, who skipped national champions in 2009 and 2015, is a perfect 10-0 this week. The final is at 3 p.m. Saturday at Xfinity Arena.

Meanwhile, Clark is hoping his team’s performance was good enough to warrant a shot at the 2018 Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

“We had a really good week,” Clark said. “Not a great week, I’d say we had a really good week. I think our stats were a little bit lower, but we were still managing to win games. I don’t necessarily know how we curled [in the semifinal], I just felt I missed a critical shot or two — second end and fourth end. Overall I’m really happy with the team’s performance, hoping that we can just kind of reset, figure out what’s going on, hope we still get selected to be in the Olympic trials since we won the finals last year and were top-three this year.”

In the women’s semifinal earlier Friday, Nina Roth and her team put on a clinic against Cassie Potter, winning 8-1 in a match conceded after six ends.

Second-seeded Team Roth and third-seeded Team Potter both finished 5-2 in round-robin play — Roth earned the higher seed based on defeating Potter 8-4 Thursday. With both being former national-champion skips (Potter won in 2005, Roth in 2014), it seemed set up for a closely-contested semifinal.

But Friday’s semifinal was never a contest. Roth made a perfect draw to the button to score two in the first end and grab an early lead. Roth then put Potter under all kinds of pressure in the fifth end and ended up stealing one to go ahead 5-1. Roth stole another three in the sixth to prompt the handshakes.

Team Roth, which also includes Becca Hamilton, Aileen Geving and Tabitha Peterson, ended up curling an impressive 93 percent in the match. That compared to just 67 percent for Team Potter.

“I think the whole game we really felt good,”Roth said. “We came out and got a deuce in the first end, which really helped us to relax and just ease into things. When we we stole one in the fifth end, that was a big turning point, too. I’m just really proud of my team.”

With the victory, Team Roth clinched the berth to the World Women’s Curling Championships in Beijing, China, on March 18-26. The U.S. berth is determined by points, and Roth accumulated enough points from previous competitions to assure its place at worlds regardless of the outcome of the final.

Roth faces top-seeded Jamie Sinclair, who finished 6-1 during the round robin to earn an automatic berth to the final, for the championship at 11 a.m. Saturday.

For more on the Seattle sports scene, check out Nick Patterson’s Seattle Sidelines blog at cmg-northwest2.go-vip.net/heraldnet/tag/seattle-sidelines, or follow him on Twitter at @NickHPatterson.