Just before the start of the curling season, Jeff Richard from Kelowna was looking for a competitive team to hook up with. He called Brent Pierce from the Royal City Curling Club in New Westminster and after several conversations, they decided to join forces.

The Pierce-Richard combination has been magical so far at the Canadian Direct Insurance B.C.

Men's Curling Championships. With the front-end of second Kevin Recksiedler and lead Grant Dezura, Pierce and Richard have a perfect record at 5-0 and are one win away from returning to the Tim Hortons Brier.

They earned spot in today's final with an easy 9-2 triumph Saturday over defending champion Jim Cotter from Kelowna in the Page playoff (1 vs. 2 contest).

"My third from last year [Tom Shypitka] didn't want to play a total competitive season so I went looking for a new team,'' said the 32-year-old Richard, who won the B.C. championship in 2010 as a skip. "When we put this team together, we clicked almost immediately. We started off with Brent calling the game and I threw the final stones. In November, we switched and Brent threw the last stones and I played third.

"So far, we have met all of our goals. We won the Wainwright bonspiel and finished second in two others. Everything is working for us and we just need one more solid performance.''

Richard is from a curling family. His father Gerry won a Brier and world championship with Rick Folk in 1994. His sister Jeanna Schraeder is a two-time Scotties Tournament of Hearts winner and a world champion.

In the game against Cotter, Pierce held a 3-1 lead in the fourth end when Cotter was light with a draw and gave up a steal of three.

Chris Baier and his young shooters from Royal City stayed alive with a quarter-final win over Sean Geall from Delta with an exciting 9-8 extra-end victory. Jason Montgomery from Duncan was playing third for Geall.

Baier, who is from Victoria, fell behind 4-1 to Geall before storming back for the victory.

The other members of the Baier rink are Michael Johnson (he throws the final stones), Jay Wakefield and John Cullen.

Baier and his mates were playing the semifinal against Cotter which was in progress at press time.

The final is set for 5 p.m. today and it will shown on Shaw-TV.

The B.C. winner advances to the Brier, March 3-11 in Saskatoon.

The Island was represented by four teams - Jody Epp, Jay Tuson and Neil Dangerfield, all from the Victoria Curling Centre and Steve Waatainen from Nanaimo. Tuson, backed by Colin Mantik, Glen Jackson and Ken Tucker, lost the AEvent qualifying game to Pierce and then a C-Event qualifier to Baier. This year's provincials was a 16team, triple knockout event, a change from the recent 10-team round-robin format.

rrauch@timescolonist.com