Newfoundland/Labrador's Brad Gushue gave his playoff hopes a major boost on Wednesday morning at the Tim Hortons Brier Canadian men's curling championship in Winnipeg.

Gushue's St. John's foursome — third Mark Nichols, second Chris Schille and lead Dave Noftall — picked up a Draw 12 victory at the MTS Centre, dropping Manitoba's Kerry Burtnyk 9-4.

The result left the teams tied for fourth place in the 12-team round-robin standings with 5-3 records.

Newfoundland/Labrador broke the game open in the third end by scoring four, and never looked back.

"It's still a long way to go," cautioned Gushue. "We still have to play Alberta this afternoon, and we have two tough games tomorrow (against New Brunswick and Prince Edward Island). We're still in the thick of it, but there's still a long way to go."

In other Draw 12 play, Ontario's Glenn Howard bounced back nicely from taking his first loss a night earlier, knocking off New Brunswick's James Grattan 8-5. Ontario took control of the game with a steal of one in the fourth, then scored three in the sixth to improve to 7-1. New Brunswick dipped to 2-6.

Northern Ontario's Eric Harnden snapped a six-game losing streak, cruising to a 7-2 win over Nova Scotia's Brian Rafuse. Both teams came out of the draw with 2-6 records.

And in the other morning tilt, Chad Cowan of the Yukon/Northwest Territories stole the winning point in the 10th end for a 5-4 win over 2006 Brier champ Jean-Michel Menard of Quebec. Both teams now sport 2-6 records.

Alberta's Kevin Martin (7-0), Saskatchewan's Pat Simmons (6-1), B.C.'s Bob Ursel (3-4) and P.E.I.'s Peter Gallant (3-4) all had byes.

Play at the the Tim Hortons Brier resumes Wednesday with draws at 3 p.m. and 8 p.m.; both draws will be on TSN.