Team Canada secures playoff spot at World Men’s Curling Championship

Team Canada is the first team to qualify for the playoffs at the 2025 World Men’s Curling Championship in Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. 

That became official on Thursday evening, just before the team—composed of skip Brad Jacobs, vice-skip Marc Kennedy, second Brett Gallant, lead Ben Hebert, and alternate Tyler Tardi—earned their ninth win of the tournament, defeating Switzerland 10-4. 

They are now one win away from locking up first place in the round robin, which would secure a semifinal bye as well as the advantage of first-end hammer and choice of rocks in the playoffs. The top two teams in the standings advance directly to the semifinals while the teams ranked third to sixth will play qualification games to see who moves on. 

Team Canada has two round robin games remaining on Friday, an afternoon meeting with Austria followed by a night game against the United States. Both teams are in the bottom third of the standings. 

Although it won’t be confirmed until the end of the world championship, Team Canada’s spot in the men’s Olympic curling tournament at Milano Cortina 2026 is well within reach, now that they are locked in for the playoffs. 

Jacobs said his team played their best game of the week against the Swiss, who before the start of play on Friday were in a three-way tie for second with Scotland and Sweden, all at 7-3. 

“That’s what I said to the guys after the game; I said it only took us 10 games to find our best game of the week, but what a great time for it as we wrap up the round robin,” said Jacobs. 

“That was great. For me down at the other end, it’s just such a pleasure to see the guys throw the rock like that.”

Team Jacobs had lost their three previous meetings with Team Yannick Schwaller this season, but the Canadians were near-perfect, outcurling the Swiss 97 to 83. They shook hands after Canada scored four in the eighth end. 

“That’s as good as we can play,” said Hebert. “Not very many misses by us, a bunch of good line calls, really good strategy. Our game plan was awesome. Brad was amazing.

“If we play like that we’re going to be tough to beat, and hopefully we can keep that going.”

The victory against Switzerland was Canada’s sixth straight in Moose Jaw. Earlier on Thursday, they defeated China 8-2 in seven ends. The Chinese team skipped by Xiaoming Xu had surprised many throughout the week by being at or near the top of the standings with a 6-1 record before three straight losses. 

Team Canada opened the tournament on Saturday by cruising to a 7-3 win over Japan in nine ends. They backed it up immediately with a 7-5 win over the reigning European champions from Germany, Team Marc Muskatewitz. They improved to 3-0 when they defeated South Korea 9-3 in eight ends. 

The Canadians were handed their first loss on Monday when they fell 6-5 in an extra end to Scotland. In what was deemed to be a classic match between two powerhouse curling countries—who had both been unbeaten at that point—Bruce Mouat made a peel-weight takeout with his final stone to get the winning point. That followed Jacobs making a remarkable long raise double-takeout in the 10th end to score two and tie the game. 

They needed to bounce back in a big way because their opponent was no pushover: Team Sweden skipped by Niklas Edin, seeking his eighth world title. Team Canada broke the game open in the fourth end with a draw for three that gave them a three-point lead. Though they only scored singles the rest of the way, the Canadians stayed in control and had the hammer to seal the win in the 10th end. 

“I think one of the best things about this team is when we lose games, we talk about why,” said Jacobs. “We had a really good discussion and debrief after the Scotland game to be able to come out today with the right energy and be in the right headspace. We’ve been resilient all season, so that’s a big win, beating Sweden.”

They followed up by grinding out a 4-2 win over Italy, last year’s world bronze medallists, on Tuesday night. On Wednesday, they earned a pair of 8-3 victories over Norway and Czechia. 

Seven countries will qualify for men’s curling at Milano Cortina 2026 based on their combined performances at the 2024 and 2025 World Championships, joining host nation Italy. Canada carried in a second-place finish from last year’s worlds. The last two spots in the Olympic tournament will be decided at the Olympic Qualification Event to be held December 6-19 in Kelowna, British Columbia. 

Canada qualified for the women’s Olympic tournament after Team Homan won their second straight world title in March. 

The women’s and men’s teams that will take on the mantle of being Team Canada at Milano Cortina 2026 will be determined at the Canadian Curling Trials in November 2025.

After the men’s worlds, Gallant will join forces with his wife, Jocelyn Peterman, to compete at the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship, taking place April 26-May 3 in Fredericton, New Brunswick. As the winners of the Canadian Mixed Doubles Curling Trials in early January, they would qualify themselves for Milano Cortina 2026 if Canada is among the top seven nations when the 2024 and 2025 results are combined. Canada finished fifth at last year’s world championship.