Team Dunstone opens 2026 LGT World Men’s Championship Friday in Ogden, Utah

Matt Dunstone’s quest for a spot on the world championship medal podium will begin Friday when the 2026 LGT World Men’s Curling Championship gets underway at the Weber County Ice Sheet in Ogden, Utah.

Dunstone, vice-skip Colton Lott, second E.J. Harnden, lead Ryan Harnden, alternate Geoff Walker, team coach Caleb Flaxey and national coach Jeff Stoughton will open play Friday with a pair of games: at 3:30 p.m. (all times Eastern) against Team Soo-Hyuk Kim of South Korea, and at 9 p.m. against Team Stefano Spiller of Italy.

Team Dunstone earned the right to wear the Maple Leaf by winning gold at the 2026 Montana’s Brier, presented by AGI, earlier this month in St. John’s, N.L.

Since then, the team had to make a roster adjustment with Walker, who will be participating in his sixth world men’s championship, taking over as alternate for Jacob Horgan, who’d previously committed to playing in the 2026 Canadian Mixed Doubles Championship taking place this week in Surrey, B.C., with partner Kira Brunton.

All four members of the starting lineup have an abundance of world championship experience, although for Dunstone and Lott, it will be their first World Men’s Championship. They played together at the 2013 and 2016 World Junior Championships, winning bronze on both occasions. Dunstone also skipped Canada to a fifth-place finish at the 2015 Winter Universiade, while Lott and his wife Kadriana represented Canada at the 2024 World Mixed Doubles Championship, and will do so again next month in Geneva, Switzerland. Lott also won a World Juniors gold medal in 2015 as the alternate for Braden Calvert’s Canadian team, while Dunstone was the alternate for Calvert’s fourth-place World Juniors Canadian team in 2014.

The Harnden brothers won gold together as members of Team Brad Jacobs at the 2014 Winter Olympics, and silver with the same team a year earlier at the 2013 World Men’s Championship in Victoria, B.C. E.J. Harnden also played in the 2022, 2023 and 2024 World Men’s Championships with Team Brad Gushue, winning silver all three times.

Team Canada will complete its opening weekend in Ogden with games Saturday at 4 p.m. against Team Ross Whyte of Scotland and Sunday at 4 p.m. against Team John Shuster of the United States.

Other competing countries are China (skipped by Xiaoming Xu), Czechia (skipped by Lukas Klima), Germany (skipped by Marc Muskatewitz), Japan (skipped by Tsuyoshi Yamaguchi), Norway (skipped by Andreas Haarstad), Poland (skipped by Konrad Stych), Sweden (skipped by Niklas Edin) and Switzerland (skipped by Marco Hoesli).

Canadian teams have had success in previous events staged at the Weber County Ice Sheet. At the 2001 World Junior Curling Championships, Canadian teams skipped by Gushue and Suzanne Birt won gold medals. A year later, at the 2002 Winter Olympics, Canada’s Team Kevin Martin won men’s silver and Team Kelley Law won women’s bronze.

It will be the 67th edition of the world men’s championship; Canada has won a leading 36 world men’s titles, and Canadian teams have reached the podium 58 times in those 66 previous world championships, collecting 14 silver and eight bronze to go along with the gold medals.

The 2026 LGT World Men’s Championship will feature a 13-team field. Round-robin play will run through to Thursday, April 2, with the top six teams making the playoffs; no tiebreakers will be played, so ties for playoff spots will be broken based on head-to-head results, and if that doesn’t resolve the tie, then the pre-game Last-Shot Draw distances.

The top two teams from round-robin play will be seeded directly into the semifinals on April 3, while third will play sixth and fourth will play fifth in the qualifying-round games earlier on April 3.

The winners of the qualifying-round games will advance to the semifinals. The semifinal winners will play for gold on April 4 at 4 p.m., with the semifinal losers battling for bronze on April 4 at 11 a.m.

TSN/RDS2, the official broadcast partners of Curling Canada’s Season of Champions, will provide live coverage of Canada’s round-robin games, in addition to all playoff games. CLICK HERE for their complete broadcast schedule.

The list of teams, schedule information, and live scoring can be found by CLICKING HERE.