Draw 3.3: Martin vs Gosselin

This was a must win for Team Martin in order to hold pace with the President's Trophy leaders.

End 1: With hammer (woohoo), we play a fairly open end and are left with a double for two or a miss and give up one situation. We miss the final rock on some very bizarre ice (especially with low roation that mon equipe tends to throw), leading to a steal of one (boohoo).
End 2: A blank. The upnormal weight with positive handle on my blank attempt kept the rock running true.
End 3: They steal another single after icky misses the draw short (a common theme tonight).
End 4: Facing a Gosselin stone on the button buried, icky's left with a tough angle raise takeout and stick for two. A miss was not an option at this stage of the game. In championship form, icky nails the shot to tie the game. The babies in the crowd rejoice!
End 5: Icky makes a nice draw to sit third shot (could have been shot if swept properly!), but it cut down the path for the draw for three by the opponents. Instead, they opt for a testy hack weight hit that they are inside and catches the curl (low rotation problem again), raising our long guard (which happened to be my first draw that was well short) into the house, knocking their own shot rock out and leaving us sitting a single. What a break!
End 6: Blank.
End 7: Team Martin steals two after a draw sails long by the opposition.
End 8: One missed peel by irby that resulted in icky needing both his hits for the win. We run them out of stones.

Endnotes: Martin sits atop at 3-0 followed by Ritchie and Shepherd at 2-1. McKenzie and Grinspun are 1-2 with Gosselin bringing up the rear with no wins. Martin's final two games this draw will be critical, matches against Ritchie and Shepherd.