By Joel Gasson

Steve Laycock rink ready for 2nd Brier

Feb 26, 2015 | 1:46 PM

Now that the women’s Canadian curling champion has been decided, it will soon be the men’s turn with the Brier set to begin in Calgary.

It will unofficially open Thursday night as the qualification round begins featuring Yukon, Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island.

Steve Laycock and his Saskatchewan rink will skip the qualification round as they begin their quest to end the province’s 34-year Brier drought. This trip to national championship will be Laycock’s second trip to the big show after making his debut, as a skip, last year. He thinks the experience will be a big help.

“The Brier is a pretty big event as far as media attention, crowd size and just the feel to the event,” Laycock told the Green Zone on Wednesday.

“To go through that for the first time is a lot different than your returning time.”

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The biggest thing that Laycock and his team learned last year was just how long of a week it is.

“Eleven games over six or seven day period is quite a bit,” he said.

“Don’t get too excited about the wins or too down about the losses.”

Often, first-timers finish near the bottom of the standings with only a handful of wins. Laycock ended the championship with a 6-5 record.

Despite everything, Laycock had a chance of making the playoffs at the end of the week. Unfortunately for Laycock, he missed his last shot against New Brunswick, sending Quebec to the playoffs instead.

That game was a learning experience for the team.

“Particularly that last shot. I think we just didn’t stick with the communication we normally have and there was four different ideas of what that spot on the ice was going to do,” he said.

“That kind of stuff can happen as you get fatigued over the end of the week and get into those pressure situations. Sometimes the communication slows down a bit. I think that’s what we learned from that.”

Coming into this year’s Brier, Team Laycock is ranked fifth in the men’s standings. The team out of the Nutana Curling Club is ahead of teams like Kevin Koe, Glenn Howard, Jeff Stoughton, Mike Kean, Jean-Michel Menard and John Morris.

“We’re definitely a lot better prepared than we were heading into the Brier last year,” said Laycock.

“That being said, it’s a much tougher field this year. The two will kind of even out a little bit.”

This year’s field is definitely one of the stronger fields at the Brier in a while. Among the team’s joining Laycock in Calgary will be Koe, Morris, Menard, Brad Jacobs, Brad Gushue, Reid Carruthers, Jamie Koe and Jim Cotter.

“There can be a lot of parity across the field. Nothing like the free spaces on the bingo card that you sometimes get referred to,” said Laycock.

Saskatchewan’s Brier opens on Saturday afternoon against Newfoundland.

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