Dunstone vs. Koe to be featured in opening night of Montana's Brier on TSN
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The opening night of the 2025 Montana’s Brier from beautiful Kelowna, B.C., has arrived as Manitoba’s Team Matt Dunstone, the No. 1 squad in Canada, will take on Alberta’s Team Kevin Koe in the Draw 1 feature match.
Dunstone’s rink from the Fort Rouge Curling Club in Winnipeg is putting together a solid season, especially after adding power sweeper EJ Harnden, formerly of Team Brad Gushue, to the lineup in December, reuniting him with brother, Ryan.
Third BJ Neufeld was cut to make room for Harnden as Colton Lott now throws vice stones.
Team Dunstone is 22-3 with the Harnden brothers in the lineup, winning two of their four events they’ve played together.
"It probably never hurts that the guy's brother is on the team," Dunstone remarked on the addition of Harnden. "I think that just goes to show how many fans EJ has across our nation. How people were pulling for him to get back into a situation. I think that's why you saw it go as smooth as it did. Very excited to have the two of them back together. The Brush Bros - you could tell right away they hadn't really missed a beat."
The 29-year-old Dunstone, who lives down the road in Kamloops, has been a perennial contender over six previous appearances at the Brier, including losing the 2023 final to Brad Gushue in London.
He might have his best chance of capturing his first Tankard this season with the new lineup and strong recent play.
"You think about it every day [winning the Brier]. It's just a moment I've run through my mind, in my head, how it's going to play out, how it's going to feel, how it's going to look, you know 100 times," Dunstone told TSN's Bob Weeks on the latest edition of Rock Talk. "Just would love to get back into that scenario again. [I've] been close so many times already. Just been biting at every Brad's, every Kevin's heel, every Brendan's heel for the last handful of years. Just can't get through to the bone. This is the most confident I've ever felt going into a Brier."
On the other side of the sheet will be Alberta’s Team Kevin Koe, ranked ninth in Canada, out of the Glencoe Club in Calgary.
Koe also made a lineup change this season, parting ways with second Jacques Gauthier and adding Alberta skip Aaron Sluchinski to the fold. Sluchinski is now the third with Tyler Tardi at second and Karrick Martin at lead.
With Sluchinski joining the team following September’s PointsBet Invitational, Team Koe have qualified for the playoffs just three times across nine events. They did win December’s Western Showdown in Swift Current.
Koe will make his 13th – and seventh straight – appearance at the Brier and will look to get the bad taste out of his mouth from last year’s performance.
The 50-year-old four-time Brier champion crashed out with a 2-6 record last year in Regina, resulting in a rare playoff miss.
Pool A appears to be the tougher of the two pools with the likes of Dunstone, Koe, Brad Gushue, John Epping and Reid Carruthers all battling for three playoff spots.
With tiebreakers a thing of the past at the Montana’s Brier, Friday’s opener could end up having major playoff implications.
Dunstone and Koe have not played each other this season.
Other Pool A games in opening draw
The opening games from Prospera Place - home of the WHL's Kelowna Rockets - will feature teams out of the highly contested Pool A, otherwise known as this year's "Pool of Death."
Three-time defending champion Brad Gushue and his new-look St. John's rink featuring former skip Brendan Bottcher will take on Newfoundland and Labrador's Team Ty Dilello in a matchup of two teams from The Rock.
Gushue, alongside longtime teammates Mark Nichols and Geoff Walker, are looking to win a seventh career Brier Tankard, which would set a new all-time record passing Randy Ferbey.
Team Gushue haven't won an event all season and went 0-4 at their most recent Grand Slam in January.
Elsewhere, the Manitoba champions led by Reid Carruthers and their recently acquired third BJ Neufeld will open their Brier schedule against British Columbia skipped by rookie Cameron de Jong.
Carruthers, 40, will make this 13th appearance at the Brier this year and his rink could be a dark horse to make a run if they can catch lightning in a bottle following the late addition of Neufeld.
John Epping will also be in action as he makes his first Brier appearance since 2021 with his new rink from Northern Ontario. They'll take on Brier veteran James Grattan and his foursome from New Brunswick.
Epping 's team from Sudbury, featuring the brother duo of Jacob and Tanner Horgan, have won 65 of their 84 games, picking up six bonspiel victories along the way.
Grattan is bringing back the same lineup that went 1-7 in Regina last year.
Pool B action begins Saturday afternoon.