China coach Rocque back in familiar venue at world men’s curling playdowns

“The memories are fantastic in this building,” said Rocque, a native of St. Paul, Alta. “It’s a magical place for me.”

His current team, however, has had mixed results so far. A 9-4 loss to unbeaten Canadian Brad Gushue on Tuesday left skip Rui Liu with a 3-4 record and put him in must-win mode for the rest of the round-robin.

China scored an early deuce but errors led to a three-point fifth end for Canada. That was enough for Gushue to take control.

“They’re the mighty Maple Leaf for a reason,” Rocque said. “You play the big fish and you swim with the big fish in the big pond. You can’t make those mistakes.”

Gushue improved to 7-0 in the evening after an 8-2 rout of Germany’s Alexander Baumann.

Rocque played lead for the Ferbey Four side that won four Brier titles between 2001 and ’05.

On the eve of this week’s world championship, he stood by the end boards to look out at the sheet. Memories of his team’s 5-4 win over Nova Scotia’s Shawn Adams in the ’05 final quickly returned.

“It just flooded back,” Rocque said. “It’s a really cool experience to be back here in this setting. Having an opportunity to play here again — even though (I’m) not playing — I feel a part of it.”

Rocque and his former teammates — Scott Pfeifer, Dave Nedohin and skip Randy Ferbey — all got together before the afternoon draw to be welcomed by the crowd.

“I’m not going to lie, I almost had a tear there thinking about it after,” Rocque said. “You miss your teammates and you re-live, reminisce, and feel it all come back.”

Gushue, meanwhile, is the only unbeaten skip in the 12-team field.

“I think we’re loose, we’re having fun,” Gushue said. “We’re enjoying this experience and this opportunity. We’re playing well, which is good.”

In the other late games, Italy’s Joel Retornaz defeated Russia’s Alexey Stukalskiy 9-5 and Switzerland’s Peter de Cruz beat Jaap Van Dorp of the Netherlands 9-6.

American John Shuster needed an extra end to get by Japan’s Yusuke Morozumi 7-6.

After 11 draws, Sweden’s Niklas Edin and de Cruz were in second place at 6-1. Italy, the U.S., and Japan were tied at 4-3.

China, Norway and Scotland were clinging to slim playoff hopes at 3-4 and Germany fell to 2-5. The Netherlands and Russia remained winless at 0-7.

Round-robin play continues through Thursday night. The top four teams will make the playoffs.

Medal games are scheduled for Sunday.

Rocque returned to the Chinese program last year and plans to guide the national men’s team through the 2018 Olympics.

He spent a season with the program ahead of the 2014 Sochi Games and helped the team finish fourth.

“Really the decision was simply that we have to give back to this game that’s so good to us,” Rocque said. “So helping the game grow in a market like China is a reward in itself.

“Any positive thing I can do there is good for our game.”

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Follow @GregoryStrongCP on Twitter.

Gregory Strong, The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

China coach Rocque back in familiar venue at world men’s curling playdowns

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