Gushue misses chance to clinch Olympic playoff spot, falls to ROC in extra end

Canada's Brad Gushue and his teammates had the opportunity to clinch a men's curling semifinal spot, but instead took a 7-6, extra-end defeat to Sergei Glukhov of the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) on Tuesday.

Now, the Canadian men's curling team will advance to the Olympic semifinals if they beat Great Britain on Wednesday at 8 p.m. ET in the final game of the round robin. Failing that, Canada would need at least two of the teams chasing them to lose.

Gushue's rink entered the game riding a three-game win streak, which included a clutch 10-8 victory over China earlier in the day, but saw the positive run come to a halt in an extra end.

"It's a disappointing game. We gave up so many opportunities," Gushue said after the match. "We could have scored two or three a number of times in the first five or six ends and then we seemed to give it away every single time."

"Sergei [Glukhov] made a bunch of good shots to kind of take those away from us once we gave him the opportunity. So credit to him, he played well."

After scoring one against Russia in the opening end, Canada played catch-up for the remainder of the match and never regained the lead.

Trailing 6-4 in the 10th end, Gushue managed to score a pair to force an extra end but could only watch as the Russian skip drew to the button with the final rock to seal the victory.

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With one game remaining, Canada (5-4) sits third in the standings, just ahead of Russia (4-4) and the United States (4-4). Switzerland follows at 3-4 but has more games left to play.

Only the top four teams at the end of the round robin qualify for the medal round.

Sweden (7-1) and Great Britain (6-1) have already locked up the top two spots.

"We get a day off tomorrow. We will rest up, cheer for whoever we need to cheer for to see if things can go our way, but our fate is still in our own hands," said Gushue.

Canada will qualify to the semifinals despite a loss to Great Britain if both Switzerland and the ROC lose their final round robin game. The Swiss team will face Sweden while the Russians will take on Great Britain.

Olympic semifinals are set to begin on Thursday.

"We are so excited to win such an important game against a big team. We played fantastic today," Glukhov said. "We just tried to do the same things every day, to keep our routine and positive thinking."

In other results, Great Britain (6-1) spoiled already-qualified Sweden's perfect record (7-1) by claiming a 7-6 victory to move into second place in the standings.

Reigning champions the United States (4-4) also suffered a setback in their hopes of making the top four, losing 10-4 to Italy (2-5), who had already been eliminated. Hosts China (3-5) beat Norway (3-5) 8-6 in the other evening matchup.

WATCH | That Curling Show: What to expect from Team Gushue in Beijing: