Scotland’s Team Mouat made a powerful start to their only match of the third day at the BKT Tires & OK Tire World Men’s Curling Championship in Ottawa, but were made to work all the way by an inspired opponent before securing an 8-6 win over Germany.
Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan were clearly intent on making a statement following their defeat by defending champions Sweden the previous evening as they surged into a 5-0 lead after stealing at three successive ends.
With German skip Sixten Totzek struggling to that point, it consequently looked as if they were on course for an early finish when they lay two well protected shots as he prepared to deliver the final stone of the fifth end. 
Instead Totzek gave his team a huge lift when his angled raise double takeout saw Germany score two and head into the midway break with a glimmer of hope.
That became brighter on the resumption when a rare unforced error by Mouat allowed the Germans to steal at the sixth and after forcing the Scots at the next, Totzek then produced an even more spectacular strike when faced with another unpromising position with Mouat lying shot and again looking to have all the angles covered.
Squeezing down the narrowest of paths, he raised a Scottish stone onto one of his own to produce the unlikeliest of takeouts of the shot stone and lie two to bring his side right back into the match at 6-5 down with two ends remaining.
The Scots maintained their composure, however, setting up the opportunity for Mouat to draw for two shots at the ninth end and they were able to run their opponents out of stones at the last.
”It was a good win and nice to rebound after the loss yesterday,” said Mouat
“Sixten played some amazing shots to keep them in it and we just had to be patient and try to get over the line. 
“We managed to get our two at nine to give us some breathing room and that got us the win.”
They now head into two matches against familiar opponents, meeting the USA’s 2018 Olympic champions Team Shuster and then Switzerlands Team Schwaller whom they beat in the final of this season’s European Championships feeling comfortable in the environment.
“We’re really happy with the conditions,” said Mouat.
“The ice was a wee bit faster there, so a lot of our stones were heavy, but it’s always about learning and we’re not too worried because we know how to adjust to those conditions and we really like them, so we’re really positive going on to tomorrow’s games.”
WATCH LIVE games from Recast’s The Curling Channel
BKT Tires & OK Tire World Men’s Curling Championships
Images: WCF/Celine Stucki & Steve Seixeiro
Schedule and Results:
Saturday 1 April
Session 1
Scotland – Italy 7-4
Sunday 2 April
Session 3
Scotland – Turkiye 8-1
Session 4
Scotland – Sweden 4-7
Monday 3 April
Session 7
Scotland – Germany 8-6
Tuesday 4 April
Session 9 – 14.00
Scotland – USA
Session 11 – 00.00
Scotland – Switzerland
Wednesday 5 April
Session 12 14.00
Scotland – Japan
Session 14 00.00
Scotland – Korea
Thursday 6 April
Session 16 19.00
Scotland – Norway
Session 17 00.00
Scotland – Canada
Friday 7 April
Session 19 19.00
Scotland – Czech Republic
Session 20 00.00
Scotland – New Zealand
Saturday 8 April
Qualification Games 14.00
Semi Finals 00.00
Sunday 9 April
Bronze medal game 16.00
Gold medal game 21.00
Team Mouat
Bruce Mouat
Grant Hardie
Bobby Lammie
Hammy McMillan
Kyle Waddell (alternate)
Michael Goodfellow (Team Coach)
Ross Paterson (Coach)
Nigel Holl (Team Leader)
#curling #WMCC2023
