Reigning Canadian and world champion Glenn Howard opened his title defence at the Tim Hortons Brier with a victory on a snowy Saturday afternoon at the MTS Centre in Winnipeg.

Howard and his Coldwater and District Curling Club foursome — third Richard Hart, second Brent Laing and lead Craig Savill — shook off a slow start to roll up an 8-4 victory over Bob Ursel of B.C.

The Lotuslanders had jumped out to an early 3-1 lead with a fourth-end deuce, but Ontario bounced back with singles in the fifth and sixth ends, a stolen deuce in the seventh and three more in the eighth and cruised home with the victory.

"That was a great character-builder, I think," said Howard. "I thought the first five ends, B.C. outplayed us. They played terrific, and we played OK. We missed a couple shots and they capitalized. We had our hands full. The thing is, we hung in there, put a little pressure on them and Jim (B.C.'s last-rock thrower Jim Cotter) missed a couple shots we didn't expect him to miss."

In other first-draw play, hometown favourite Kerry Burtnyk sent the fans home happy after knocking off Chad Cowan of the Yukon/Northwest Territories 6-5. Burtnyk opened the game with two in the first end — he had a chance at three but rolled out on an open hit — and never looked back against the Northerners.

Northern Ontario's Eric Harnden got out to a winning start; he stole a pair in the seventh end and hung on for an 8-5 triumph over Prince Edward Island's Peter Gallant.

In the other first-draw tilt, Saskatchewan's Pat Simmons scored four in the fifth end on the way to a 7-6 win over Brad Gushue of Newfoundland/Labrador.

Alberta's Kevin Martin, New Brunswick's James Grattan, Nova Scotia's Brian Rafuse and Quebec's Jean-Michel Menard all had first-round byes.

Play at the the Tim Hortons Brier resumes at 8 p.m. (all times Eastern) with four more games. TSN will show the draw live.

On Sunday, games are scheduled for 9:30 a.m., 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.; curltv.com will show the morning draw, while the latter two draws will be on TSN.