The votes are in and Marc Kennedy is going to the Dominion All-Star Curling Skins Game.
The Olympic gold medallist from St. Albert was the top second in online balloting for the TSN skins event, Jan. 19-20 at Casino Rama in Ontario.
Kennedy's teammates on the Kevin Martin rink – third John Morris and lead Ben Hebert – also led their respective positions in voting. Martin finished third among skips.
Morris received the most votes at 29,667. Kennedy was the runner-up at 29,482 and Hebert placed third at 28,751. Martin garnered 22,596 votes, 1,688 less than the first-place skip, Glenn Howard.
"It's great for the whole team. Johnny and me and Benny were top three, so it's good. It means that curling fans still care about us," Kennedy told the Gazette Tuesday, prior to flying to Kelowna for the Canadian Open of Curling.
"It also means my wife (Nicole), the campaign manager, did a great job to help us get those votes."
The new format determined which Canadian male curlers will compete for $100,000 in prize money.
The all-star ballot consisted of players from the top teams in the Canadian Team Ranking System for the 2011/12 season.
The four players with the most votes in each position qualified for the all-star weekend. Players will then be selected by position via a random draw to create four all-star teams skipped by Martin, Howard, Jeff Stoughton and Kevin Koe. Players can't play for their own skips. TSN will televise the draw Jan. 17.
"It should be a lot of fun," Kennedy said.
The total number of votes at the Dec. 10 deadline surpassed 550,000. Ontario led the way with 33 per cent of the votes cast, followed by Alberta at 19 per cent and Manitoba at 17 per cent.
"The response was great. They got over half a million votes, which is a ton," Kennedy said. "It's a great idea but I think it needs some fine tuning. The voting period was way too long."
Martin, who underwent a hernia operation this week, is expected to be back on the ice in time for the skins game. His injury forced the 2010 Olympians to parachute in Joe Frans from Ontario to play third at the Canadian Open, the second of four Grand Slam events. Morris will call the shots. Frans was Morris' third on the Ontario rink that lost the 2002 Brier to the Ferbey Four.
"It's going to be interesting. It will be the first time we haven't played with Kevin in seven years so I think we're excited but I guess a little bit nervous too. We've always had that security of having Kevin to bail us out or to finish an end off and we don't have that now so we'll see how it goes," Kennedy said.
The Saville Sports Centre foursome are coming off a disappointing 1-5 performance in the seven-team round robin at the recent Canada Cup in Moose Jaw. Afterwards, Martin was diagnosed with a hernia.
"He's been in pain for about a month-and-a-half and none of us knew so hopefully when he gets healthy we can turn things around and start winning like we used to," said Kennedy.
He described the team's season so far as average.
"We've had some good events and we've also struggled as of late, so the news of Kevin's injury I guess explained a lot of the struggles."
Teams have also ramped up their game in pursuit of berths at the 2013 Canadian Olympic Trials in Winnipeg. Martin's rink punched its ticket to the trials last winter.
"We still go about our business like we always have. We work hard. We practice hard. We try and play with as much emotion and intensity as we can," Kennedy said. "The truth is I think it's increasing the other teams' level of play when they're desperate for that trials spot. We're running into teams that are dying to get these CTRS points so they're playing with desperation and playing really well. We don't have that same level of desperation right now and we just need to keep working on trying to find it."
Kennedy, 30, believes his season has been good, but not great.
"I can be tough on myself so there is always room for improvement but I feel my preparation for the trials next year is right on track so I'm confident. We just have some team things to get sorted out and we should be good to go," said the Paul Kane High School alumnus.
Brier hopefuls
The Martin rink is also peaking towards the Feb. 6 to 10 provincials in Leduc for a shot at the Brier, March 2 to 10 at Rexall Place.
"It's a big goal for us this year. None of us have played a Brier in Edmonton. We played in the Roar of the Rings in '09 and that was amazing," said Kennedy, a four-time Brier first team all-star.
The three-time Alberta champions, two-time Brier winners and 2008 world gold medallists failed to make the provincial final last winter.
"Hopefully for us Kevin is healthy at that time. He says he will be so hopefully we can try and take down the powerhouse Koe team," Kennedy said of the two-time provincial winners and 2010 Brier and world champions who beat Martin in the first Grand Slam event in November in the semifinals.
The Martin rink avoided the playdown trail by racking up the most CTRS points in the province by the Dec. 1 cutoff date. Also earning qualifying berths was Koe as the defending champion, and Brendan Bottcher and the St. Albert-based Jamie King rink. Bottcher and King were ranked first and second, respectively, in the Alberta Curling Tour standings.
This is the first season together for King's star-studded line-up of Blake McDonald (third for Koe's Brier and world championship team), Scott Pfeifer (five-time Alberta champion, four-time Brier winner and three-time world gold medallist with the Ferbey Four) and Jeff Erickson (two-time U20 Alberta champion curling with Kennedy).
"They had a good year. Funny with a team like that; everyone kind of thinks they're semi-retired and they're not going to be that good but those are four pretty outstanding curlers. They have a chance for sure. The only thing that might hurt them is the partying," said Kennedy, who joined Pfeifer as the inaugural six inductees into the St. Albert Curling Club's wall of fame in 2011.
