Not many world-class athletes leave their sport at the top of their game.
But curler Don Duguid did — not once, but twice. His one and only return to the game as a player was memorable as the man they called The Digit came back to skip Canada to back-to-back Air Canada Silver Broom World curling championships in 1970 and 1971, winning all 17 games his team played, the only foursome to have ever done that in consecutive years.
Duguid passed away Wednesday evening at the age of 90. His son Terry made the announcement in a Facebook post on Thursday.
Don Duguid enjoyed a sparkling career on the ice and a rewarding one in the broadcaster booth after his playing days were done.
Certainly he was a giant on the ice in Canada, playing in four national men’s curling championships for Manitoba and winning three of them, twice as a skip and once as third. He also played second in his Brier debut for Howard Wood Jr. in 1957.
It was after winning the 1965 Brier as third for Terry Braunstein that Duguid first called it quits in the wake of a silver-medal performance at that year’s World Championship in Perth, Scotland.
But it wasn’t long until he was lured back into the game. The Winnipeg Granite Club team of third Rod Hunter, second Jim Pettapiece and lead Bryan (Woody) Wood was in need of a new skip, and Duguid was the perfect fit.
The team was dynamite together. Hunter, nicknamed The Arrow, was one of the best thirds in the world and the front end of Pettapiece and Wood could sweep a sheet of ice down to the concrete. It was nothing but champagne and roses over the next two years.
This was also the time when there were no automatic byes into anything. After their first world title in Utica, N.Y., Duguid and Co. had to fight their way through a club championship, zone playdowns and the Manitoba Consols just to get back to the Brier.
Duguid said his decision to retire for good at age 37 after the second world title in Megève, France, was a no-brainer. There were no multi-million dollar contracts waiting for him, but there was an opportunity to work for the CBC.
He jumped at the chance, put his broom aside, and went on to enjoy a 29-year career with the CBC as a curling analyst, mostly with announcers Don Chevrier and Don Wittman.
He became well-know across Canada doing ‘colour’, and his “two schools of thought on this one” when discussing strategy became his signature statement.
After he finished up at CBC, he continued his broadcast work in the United States with NBC, covering the Winter Olympics.
Duguid was an innovator. He perfected what’s known as the ‘Manitoba Tuck’ delivery, where curlers slide out on their toes, heel raised and foot tucked under their body, inspiring future Manitoba stars such as Kerry Burtnyk, Vic Peters, Jeff Stoughton, Mike McEwen and reigning Montana’s Brier champion Matt Dunstone.
Duguid also was co-founder of one of the first curling schools in the world and taught the game all over the globe after he retired.
He was inducted into the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame in 1974, Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in 1991, and the World Curling Hall of Fame in 2013. In 2014, he was made a member of the Order of Manitoba, and in 2020 was appointed to the Order of Canada, one of the nation’s highest honours.
Funeral arrangements are pending.
