Jason Gunnlaugson, Alex Forrest, Adam Casey and Connor Njegovan are one win away from playing in an "A" Side qualifier at the 2020 Viterra Championship.

The Morris Curling Club foursome built an early 8-1 lead and defeated Darren Perche of the Charleswood Curling Club 10-5 on the opening draw of the Provincial Men's Curling Championship Wednesday morning at the Eric Coy Arena in Winnipeg.

"It’s definitely nice to start off early and get settled into the week," said Gunnlaugson. "It's going to start slow and then it gets ramped up real fast come Friday. That's the goal and it was a nice day today."

Gunnlaugson got three points in the first and third ends and then watched the Charleswood foursome get back in the game thanks to a three of their own in the fifth and a steal of one in the sixth end.

"It was a good game," said the Morris skip whose team is the second seed in Winnipeg behind defending champion Mike McEwen. "I think we played them the year before and they played a lot better today. This is the amazing part of the 32-team format in Manitoba, some of the teams get some opportunities on arena ice and after a couple they start to get the hang of it. They play much better and you get more of their normal game where as the first couple of times they don’t play as well. They played a nice game. We were kind of learning the conditions and it felt good."

Gunnlaugson, Forrest, Casey and Njegovan will face reigning Manitoba Junior champion Brett Walter of Assiniboine Memorial at 12:15 p.m. and that winner will advance to an "A" side qualifier on Friday.

Gunnlaugson noted that being a member of Morris Curling Club has its benefits as the team has access to all the technology at the world class Cargill Curling Training Centre which is managed by Level 4 NCCP Olympic coaches Lorne and Chris Hamblin.

"It’s something that we get to use a lot in the off-season. I spent probably as much time as Lorne and Chris there in the summer and that’s one of the things that lots of people don’t know is there’s ice all year round there. The rock throwing machine is fantastic and if you’re going to spend all this sweat equity in sweeping you might as well know what you’re doing and use the Rock Thrower. We do it fairly often but during the season we’re in Japan, we’re everywhere. The three of us get there a lot and Adam’s from PEI so it’s pretty tough for him."