Jamie Murphy made Nova Scotia men’s curling history on Sunday when he captured his sixth provincial championship.
Murphy (Halifax Curling Club) became the winningest skip in Tankard history when he beat clubmate Kendall Thompson 10-4 in the Deloitte final at the Dartmouth Curling Club.
Murphy said the final score wasn’t indicative of the game and credited Thompson, the only team to beat them in preliminary play, for applying the pressure throughout.
The game was close until a four-spot in the ninth ended the game.
“The linescore doesn’t show how close the game was, they played well,” said Murphy, who lost last year's championship to Kendall's brother Stuart. “We made a couple of key shots at key times and a lot of hard shots had to be made. They played extremely well.”
Murphy pointed to the third and fifth ends as pivotal in the outcome.
“There were a couple of key shots. I had to make a freeze against a couple in the third end and made a key hit through a port in the fifth end that just made the hole which was probably the turning point. If I wreck on the guard they might get three and we ended up stealing a point that end.
“You have to put yourself in a position to win and there’s a lot of pressure and it’s hard on the head, but that’s why we play.”
Murphy, who has been in nine straight finals, praised his rink mates - third Paul Flemming, second Scott Saccary and lead Philip Crowell.
“We had a really good week. We had a challenging year, we had an injury to our lead, so he couldn’t play part of the season but worked really hard to get back.
“It’s hard to go through without a blemish realistically, but we played strong all week. My guys played unbelievably and in the final when it counted.”
The Halifax skip was humbled when talking about the record-setting win. Mark Dacey (Mayflower) and Gerry Glintz (Truro) were the other five-time winning skips.
“I’ve been fortunate, I’ve had nine straight finals and been able to win six of them and I feel really lucky and fortunate to be able to win as many as we have and we are going to enjoy this as much as we can.
“At the end of the day, the guys made great shots at the right time. We enjoy playing with each other, work hard and we’re able to produce the results.”
The foursome advance to the Tim Hortons Brier in Kingston, Ont., on Feb. 29-March 8.
“We love the Brier, it’s going to be awesome to get back and compete,” said Murphy.
