Scotland’s defending champions Team Mouat completed their round robin campaign at the LGT World Men’s Curling Championships by denying Sweden a 100% record, but were unable to force their way into the top two spots in the standings that would have secured a semi final place.
A third place finish means they will have last stone advantage in the first round of play-offs where they will meet USA’s 2018 Olympic Champions Team Shuster, who they defeated earlier in the week.
The ferociously competitive nature of the round-robin was summed up by the fact that the Scots were the only one of the teams that finished in the top three of the standings a year ago to make it into the playoffs this time around, with hosts Switzerland, who had finished first in 2023 and Norway missing out this time.
Reflecting on their final round robin performances, the skip was pleased with his team’s progress which saw them finish on a 10-2 win/loss record in Schaffhausen. 
“It was nice to win our last couple of games in the round robin,” said skip Bruce Mouat.
“We played really well in that second game today and that set us up really nicely heading into the play-offs.”
Bruce Mouat, Grant Hardie, Bobby Lammie and Hammy McMillan had headed into the last day knowing they needed to win one of their games to be sure of having the hammer and last stone advantage in their first playoff match.
Their first game was against Norway, who had suffered a disappointing week and were already out of playoff contention, but still had no shortage of incentive with Olympic qualifying points at stake.
An excellent performance in the pre-match draw shot challenge meant the Scots had the upper hand early on and just as they had against Switzerland the previous evening, they moved into a three shot lead at 5-2 up after three ends.
Once again, though, they were gradually pegged back and while they never trailed at any stage, they were taken to an extra end for a second successive time, Mouat having to make a precise raised takeout with his final stone to secure the 9-8 win.
“We had a tough one against Norway which went to an extra end, but we played pretty solid when we had hammer and got control of the game,” he said.
“We just made a few slip-ups and gave them options to get back into the game, but overall it wasn’t a bad performance by any stretch of the imagination and we were in a good spot going into the Sweden game.”
They then met the unbeaten Swedes who were being led by vice-skip Oskar Eriksson in the absence of regular skip Niklas Edin, the six time world champion who had led them to eleven successive wins in their eleven previous matches at this event. 
The Scots still had an outside chance of claiming a direct place in the semi finals at that point, but although they did manage to end the Swedish run with an 8-6 victory, Canada’s 8-1 defeat of hosts Switzerland consigned them to third spot.
“We played really well and took our twos when we got our chances and forced really well,” said Mouat.
“So I am really happy where we are going into the play-offs.”
The qualification games get underway in the morning, with Scotland meeting USA and Germany taking on Italy, the winners of which will meet Sweden and Canada in the semi finals later tomorrow.
“We have played the USA a number of times throughout the years and we are excited to see what we can do against them,” he said.
“We had a really good game against them in the round robin so hopefully we can recreate that and that will boost our confidence heading into the semi finals.”
Please click here for LIVE streaming of games on The Curling Channel.
Selected games are also available on the BBC iPlayer, BBC Scotland website and app.
Next game on BBC:
Semi Final - Saturday 6 April at 3pm (BST).
Scotland v Canada
Please click here for more event information and results.
Scotland Team
Bruce Mouat
Grant Hardie
Bobby Lammie
Hammy McMillan
Kyle Waddell (alternate)
Team Coach Michael Goodfellow
Olympic Head Coach Greg Drummond
Schedule (GMT/BST) & Results
Saturday 30 March
Session 1
Scotland – Korea 10-3
Session 2
Scotland – USA 10-3
Sunday 31 March
Session 4
Scotland – Canada 4-8
Session 5
Scotland – Italy 8-3
Monday 1 April
Session 7 – 13.00
Scotland – New Zealand 8-2
Tuesday 2 April
Session 10 – 13.00
Scotland –Germany 7-8
Wednesday 3 April
Session 12
Scotland – Czechia 6-3
Session 14
Scotland –Japan 7-5
Thursday 4 April
Session 15
Scotland –Netherlands 6-3
Session 17
Scotland – Switzerland 8-7 (EE)
Friday 5 April
Session 18
Scotland –Norway 9-8 (EE)
Session 20
Scotland –Sweden 8-6
Saturday 6 April
09.00
Qualification Games
Scotland – USA
Germany - Italy
15.00
Semi Finals
Sweden -
Canada -
Sunday 7 April
09.00
Bronze Medal Game
14.00
Gold Medal Game
Image: World Curling
