The 1961

Macdonald Brier The Tim Hortons Brier, or simply (and more commonly) the Brier (''french: Le Brier''), is the annual Canadian men's curling championship, sanctioned by Curling Canada. The current event name refers to its main sponsor, the Tim Hortons coffee and ...

, the

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

men's national

curling Curling is a sport in which players slide stones on a sheet of ice toward a target area which is segmented into four concentric circles. It is related to bowls, boules, and shuffleboard. Two teams, each with four players, take turns sliding ...

championship, was held from March 6 to 10, 1961 at the

Stampede Corral The Stampede Corral was a multi-purpose venue (ice hockey, professional wrestling, rodeo, tennis) in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. Located on the grounds of Stampede Park, the arena was completed in 1950 at a cost of C$1.25 million ($ million tod ...

Calgary, Alberta Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Canadian Prairies, Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,30 ...

. A total of 51,575 fans attended the event, which was only 150 fans short of the record set in 1955 Brier in Regina. Due to issues during the 1960 Brier with brooms shredding causing numerous delays to clean the ice during games, curlers no longer could choose their own broom and instead could only use brooms provided by the Brier committee. Previously, the Brier committee had always supplied brooms, but curlers were permitted to use their own if desired. Team Alberta, who was skipped by

Hec Gervais Hector Joseph "The Friendly Giant" Gervais (November 4, 1933 – July 19, 1997) was a Canadian curler from Edmonton, Alberta. He was a two-time Brier champion and former World Champion. In curling strategy, he is considered to be the inventor of ...

captured the Brier Tankard with a record of 9–1 in round robin play. This was the eighth time in which Alberta had captured the Brier championship and the first of two Briers in which Gervais won as a skip. At the age of 27 years and 4 months, Gervais would at the time become the youngest skip to win a Brier surpassing Matt Baldwin's record by six months when he won the 1954 Brier. Gervais' rink (with Vic Raymer in place of

Ron Anton Ronald M. Anton (born c. 1942) is a Canadian retired curler. He played as third on the Hec Gervais rink that won the 1961 Brier and 1974 Brier. In 1975 he was inducted into Canadian Curling Hall of Fame The Canadian Curling Hall of Fame was estab ...

) would go on to complete in the

1961 Scotch Cup The 1961 Scotch Cup was the third edition of the men's World Curling Championship. It was held across four venues: Ayr, Kirkcaldy, Perth and Edinburgh, Scotland. The tournament began with games in Ayr on 21 March. The second and third days were ...

Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...

and eventually capture

Canada's Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by total ...

third straight World Championship.

Event Summary

Heading into the Thursday evening draw (Draw 9), there were seven teams that were mathematically alive to win the 1961 Brier.

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

was unbeaten with a 7–0 record and two games ahead of second place teams

Manitoba Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, and

Saskatchewan Saskatchewan ( ; ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province in Western Canada, western Canada, bordered on the west by Alberta, on the north by the Northwest Territories, on the east by Manitoba, to the northeast by Nunavut, and on t ...

, who all tied with 5-2 records.

Prince Edward Island Prince Edward Island (PEI; ) is one of the thirteen Provinces and territories of Canada, provinces and territories of Canada. It is the smallest province in terms of land area and population, but the most densely populated. The island has seve ...

was sitting at 5-3 while

Northern Ontario Northern Ontario is a primary geographic and quasi-administrative region of the Canadian province of Ontario, the other primary region being Southern Ontario. Most of the core geographic region is located on part of the Superior Geological Provi ...

and

Nova Scotia Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the four Atlantic provinces. Nova Scotia is Latin for "New Scotland". Most of the population are native Eng ...

were both 4–3. That evening, Northern Ontario beat Ontario 12–9, Manitoba would hold off

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

14–12, Saskatchewan eliminated Nova Scotia handily 11–3, and PEI handed Alberta their first loss of the tournament with an 11–7 victory. With Alberta's loss, the standings would tighten up heading into the final day of the Brier. The Friday morning draw (Draw 10) saw

beat

9-5 and

beat

6–5, thus eliminating both Ontario and Northern Ontario from championship contention. With Alberta's 12–4 victory over

, thus eliminating

PEI PEI or Pei may refer to: Places *Matecaña International Airport, Pereira, Colombia, IATA code PEI *Pei County (沛县), Jiangsu, China *Pei Commandery (沛郡), a commandery in Chinese history *Prince Edward Island, a province of Canada * Pei, ...

who had drawn a bye. The final draw of the tournament on Friday afternoon would come down to Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan with the latter two playing each other. An Alberta loss to Ontario would force a tiebreaker against the winner of the Manitoba/Saskatchewan matchup. In the game on Sheet B between

and

, Saskatchewan led 3-1 after the third end but Ontario would counter and score one in each of the next two ends to tie the game at 3. However, Saskatchewan would score three in the sixth to take a 6–3 lead halfway through the game. Manitoba would cut the lead to 6-5 after a score of two in the seventh, but Saskatchewan would put the game out of reach with three in the eighth and a steal of two in the ninth and eventually beat Manitoba 12–7. Meanwhile, on Sheet C, the

and

game was going in similar fashion as the game was tied 3-3 after four ends. To the delight of the Saskatchewan fans, Ontario would put up three in the fifth and a steal of two in the sixth to go up 8-3 after halfway and would lead 9-4 through eight ends. That delight would be short lived however as Alberta would rally back and tie the game at 9 with four in the eighth and a steal of one in the ninth. After a blank end in the eleventh, it would come down to the final end. With Alberta having the shot rock, it would come down to Ontario skip Thomas Caldwell's final rock. Caldwell threw an out-turn on his final stone, but the stone was too far outside and smashed against the Alberta guard giving Alberta a 10–9 victory for Gervais' first Brier and a spot in the

Teams

The teams are listed as follows:

Round robin standings

Round robin results

All draw times are listed in

Mountain Time The Mountain Time Zone of North America keeps time by subtracting seven hours from Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) when standard time ( UTC−07:00) is in effect, and by subtracting six hours during daylight saving time ( UTC−06:00). The cloc ...

( UTC-07:00)

Draw 1

''Monday, March 6 3:00 PM''

Draw 2

''Monday, March 6 8:00 PM''

Draw 3

''Tuesday, March 7 9:30 AM''

Draw 4

''Tuesday, March 7 3:00 PM''

Draw 5

''Wednesday, March 8 3:00 PM''

Draw 6

''Wednesday, March 8 8:00 PM''

Draw 7

''Thursday, March 9 9:30 AM''

Draw 8

''Thursday, March 9 3:00 PM''

Draw 9

''Thursday, March 9 8:00 PM''

Draw 10

''Friday, March 10 9:30 AM''

Draw 11

''Friday, March 10 3:00 PM''

References

External links

* Video: {{Canadian Men's Curling Championships Macdonald Brier, 1961 The Brier Sports competitions in Calgary Curling in Alberta