Swift Current's Rod Quintin will be playing in Friday's B side of the SaskTel Southern Men's Playdowns after a final rock loss in opening round action.
Regina's Chris Busby scored three with the hammer in the final end to post a 7-5 win over Quintin during evening draw action on day one.
Quintin scored one in the eighth and stole a single in the ninth end to hold a 5-4 advantage heading into the 10th end, but Busby controlled the 10th end to earn the win.
Quintin, who is backed by third Mitch Minken, second Tyler Friesen, and lead Jason Senicar, admitted there was not much of a home ice advantage in the Southern opener.
"It's a little straighter than we were used to. It didn't allow us to get around and bury with any of the draws, so that changed the way that we had to play when we tried to steal," Quintin said.
With all the other games in the evening draw decided by wide margins, the hometown skip was happy their opener was a close contest.
"I want to play a little better tomorrow and hopefully pick up a win," adding that with quick ice they have to be more patient with their shots.
"It's about patience really. The ice is very fast and it takes a lot of patience to wait for that rock to start to move and come down in speed. That's quite often what happens is that you'll get on it too soon and then you'll bump and roll over."
The only other game in the evening draw to go a full 10 ends was Langenburg's Jeff Hartung counting a 10-6 win over Derek Boe from Regina. Hartung scored four in the fourth end to enjoy a 6-1 early advantage.
Randy Bryden from Regina scored four in the fifth and stole singles in the sixth and seventh ends to post an 8-2 win over Moose Jaw's Garrett Vey in a seven end decision.
Brent Goeres of Regina scored three in the third and four in the seventh enroute to a 10-4 win over Assiniboia's Glenn Batty.
The first games on the ice on Friday will be the A side quarter finals featuring the eight winning rinks from Thursday. The 9 a.m. draw features the following games: Max Kirkpatrick (Swift Current Curling Club) vs Jason Krupski (Whitewood Curling Club); Al Schick (Regina, Highland Curling Club) vs Brent Gedak (Estevan Curling Club); Chris Busby (Regina, Highland Curling Club) vs Randy Bryden (Regina, Callie Curling Club); and Jeff Hartung (Langenburg Curling Club) vs Brent Goeres (Regina, Highland Curling Club).
The four opening B event games will be played at 3 p.m, featuring the following games: Steven Slupski (Moose Jaw Curling Centre) vs Brad Law (Regina, Tartan Curling Club); Rod Quintin (Swift Current Curling Club) vs Garrett Vey (Moose Jaw, Moose Jaw Curling Centre); Alan Batty (Assiniboia Curling Club) vs Mark Weiss (Regina, Highland Curling Club); and Derek Boe (Regina, Highland Curling Club) vs Alan Batty (Assiniboia Curling Club).
