Article content Mike McEwen has had a lot of time to reflect over the last year, while his sport was on hiatus during the COVID-19 pandemic. The 40-year-old skip from Winnipeg was thinking back to the 2020 Tim Hortons Brier in Kingston, the 2019 Canadian men’s curling championship in Brandon and the 2018 event in Regina. We apologize, but this video has failed to load. Try refreshing your browser, or Manitoba's McEwen, Gunnlaugson eager to try to take next step into playoffs at bubble Brier Back to video They all had a common theme — they all featured Curling Canada’s new 16-team, two-pool system and, on each occasion, McEwen and his teammates finished out of the playoffs.