Curling

Reigning Olympic champion Brad Gushue knocked off No. 1 seed Kevin Martin on Saturday at the World Cup of Curling in Mississauga, Ont., to move on to the semi-final.

Team Gushue, of Newfoundland, barely qualified for the quarter-final, sneaking in as the eighth seed with a 3-3 record after round robin play, while Martin was undefeated heading into the playoffs. 

Fellow Canadians Kevin Koe of Edmonton and Glenn Howard of Coldwater, Ont., also moved on to the semis. Howard scored an 8-5 victory over Germany's Andy Kapp and is the only undefeated team left in the field with a 7-0 record.

Gushue beat Martin 8-2 over six ends in the quarter-final, marking the third straight time he's beaten the Edmonton skip - the 2008 world champion and last year's silver medallist - this season. 

"That was, you know, one of the best games we've played all year," Gushue said. "We didn't miss many shots, and you know we really put the pressure on Kevin and their team."

Gushue was up 3-2 heading into the sixth end with the hammer, where his team of Ryan Fry, Mark Nichols and Jamie Korab scored five points, forcing Martin to concede.

Earlier this week Gushue said his team was playing "horrible."

"That was a very good description of how we were playing," he said.

"Today we just got draw weight, and got a good feel for the ice. And you know, once we have that feel, I think we're as good as any team out there, and I think we proved that today."  

In the semifinal at 7 p.m. ET on Saturday, Gushue will play Koe, who led Niklas Edin of Sweden from start to finish in his quarter-final, earning a 7-2 victory.

Koe's rink of Carter Rycroft, Blake MacDonald and Nolan Thiessen held Edin scoreless until the fourth end, when the Swedish skip scored a single point to make it 5-1.

Koe is now 5-2 at the World Cup event, the first Grand Slam of the season. 

Thomas Ulsrud of Norway beat Denmark's Ulrik Schmidt 8-2 over six ends to improve to a 5-2 record and move on to the semi, where he'll face Howard.

Howard is looking for his fourth straight World Cup victory, having won the event the last three years.

He had to earn his way into the semi after a close game against Kapp. The teams traded the lead back and forth up until the sixth end, when the Germans missed a shot and sealed the win for the Canadians. 

"We had our hands full against Andy Kapp in that game, they played terrific and had an uncharacteristic miss in the 6th," Howard said. "If he made that we're tied playing in the 7th, but he didn't, and we were up, so that kind of was the ballgame.

"We're exactly where we want to be and ready for the next game."

The 2007 world champion, Howard is looking to qualify for his first Olympic Games. His team, along with Martin, Koe and Randy Ferbey, are the four men's rinks already qualified for the Olympic qualifier, the Roar of the Rings in December.  

Team Gushue is among eight men's rinks that will play in next month's Road to the Roar to determine the final four berths for the Vancouver qualifier.