Share and Follow
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy — A Canadian curler caught in a storm of controversy at the Winter Olympics firmly declared on Saturday that he is not a cheat, suggesting instead that his team might be the subject of a “premeditated” attack by Sweden, a major contender for the gold medal.
Marc Kennedy admitted he “could have managed it better” following a profanity-laden confrontation with Swedish curler Oskar Eriksson. Eriksson accused him of “double-touching”—an infraction involving touching the rock again after its initial release—during Canada’s 8-6 victory in round-robin play late on Friday.
Despite the accusation, the 44-year-old Kennedy asserted that he has never stepped onto the ice “with the intention of gaining an advantage by cheating.”
Video clips widely shared online appeared to show Kennedy touching the granite stone with his finger after releasing it. When questioned about the footage, Kennedy responded, “I’m not even addressing that. It’s never been a concern for me before. It’s never even been part of the discussion.”
He added, “If someone asked, ‘Do you double-touch all the time?’ in that fleeting moment, I honestly couldn’t even say if I do or don’t.”
He added that he has his own theory, suggesting the whole thing might have been “premeditated planning to try to catch us.”
“They’ve come up with a plan to catch teams in the act,” Kennedy said.
The saga has rocked the usually sedate world of curling and it involves two teams who play each other regularly outside the Olympics and are among the best players in the game.
Kennedy receiving a verbal warning from governing body World Curling a day after the feisty back-and-forth with the Swedish team when fingers were pointed and the Canadian player repeatedly swore. He has not been formally charged with cheating by World Curling, which does not use video to review game play.
The organization opted to deploy two officials to monitor how players released their stones during Saturday’s afternoon session in the men’s competition. In that session, Canada lost 9-5 to Switzerland and Sweden beat China 6-4.
Afterward, Eriksson said he “slept good, I’m not sure about him” – in reference to Kennedy – and said he chose that moment to call out Kennedy’s alleged rule-breaking because he’d seen it happen in the past. Eriksson said he has told officials in two previous events.
“We want to play a fair-and-square game, like you follow the rules,” Eriksson said. “And if we see something that’s not following the rules, we tell the opponents or the official. This time we did both.”
The allegations kept coming.
During its game against Canada, the Swiss men’s team alerted umpires mid-match to their suspicion that a member of the Canadian team was again double-tapping, Swiss coach Glenn Howard said.
Howard is Canadian, and a well-known and highly-acclaimed curler himself.
“My whole career, you’d be like, ‘Ah, that’s okay’” if there was a minor infraction, said Howell, who said he didn’t know what to make of this latest flare-up.
In the early ends of Friday’s match, Sweden skip Niklas Edin notified officials of their complaints about Kennedy. An official then remained at the hog line – the thick green line before which curlers must release the stone – for three ends to monitor Canada’s curlers and no violations were recorded, World Curling said Saturday.
The online footage that appears to show Kennedy double-tapping the stone prompted some curling fans to question how the video was taken and point out that cameras are not usually stationed at the hog line.
A staffer for Swedish public broadcaster SVT said the channel had gotten the footage because they had moved their camera to the hog line after Sweden raised concerns about the double tapping early in the match. The camera operator stayed there until he was able to capture Kennedy’s pitch in the eighth end. Eriksson said Swedish TV had showed him that footage.
Copyright © 2026 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.