Wes Smith has been the skip for two national championship wheelchair curling teams. Will he skip in Torino?

"Getting on the ice has been really exciting," said Pierce, who had been itching to play since going at least a week since he had last thrown a curling stone. "This is starting to bring everything into sight, into the big picture. I'm just really excited and really proud to be here. It is an honor."

Coming into the eight-team competition, Pierce, 43, of Syracuse, N.Y., was one of the two players on the U.S. squad considered most likely to be the skip, calling the game strategy and throwing the last two shots of each end. But Coach Steve Brown (Madison, Wis.) is still undecided about who to put where with just four days to go before an opening round meeting with Sweden at 11 a.m. Sunday (local, six hours ahead of EST).

"The biggest thing is that these guys are all so unbelievably equal," said Brown, eyeing a roster that also includes two-time U.S. national champion skip Wes Smith (Glenburn, Maine), two-time national champion Danell Libby (Chatham, N.Y.), 2004 national champion Jim Joseph (New Hartford, N.Y.) and newcomer but hot-handed Augusto "Goose" Perez (North Syracuse, N.Y.). "There is so little difference between them that I think I could draw the names out of a hat for skip, vice skip, second, lead and alternate, and it wouldn't really matter," said Brown, a USA Curling Hall of Fame member who has coached two prior able-bodied Olympic teams (1988 and '98).

Brown used Wednesday's hour-long bus ride from the Athlete's Village in Torino to the practice facility in Pinerolo for a team meeting and pep talk. He spoke passionately about team dynamics, on-ice communication, strategy, shot-making, and the all-important mental aspects of the sport. Brown drew analogies to car racing, baseball, golf and other more mainstream sports while trying to prepare his relatively inexperienced team for not only the day's practice sessions but also the newest Paralympic sport's grandest stage.

As the city bus neared its destination at Pinerolo Palaghiaccio, Brown talked about how the wheelchair athletes need to find a way to extract something, anything out of what he termed the "40-percent factor" to gain an edge over the opposition from Canada, Denmark, Great Britain, Italy, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland. To explain, it is Brown's estimation that able-bodied curlers have a 40-percent competitive advantage over wheelchair curlers, primarily because of sweeping (not part of wheelchair curling) and the ability to use one's entire body strength in shot-making.

"The one thing on our side is that all of the other teams we're competing against lose this 40 percent, too," Brown told his team. "So if we can find a way to gain back any of that, even 10 or 15 percent, that's got to be worth at least one or two points a game."

Brown, who tried to gain a better understanding of what disabled curlers are up against by practicing from a wheelchair himself, said the best way for his team to recoup some of that 40 percent is through intense focus and strong communication amongst all the athletes on the ice. While each shot only directly involves two players (the shooter and the skip), the other two players on the ice, and the alternate in the coach's box, need to closely watch every stone to gain the best understanding of the ice conditions, and to be thinking ahead to the next shots the team will likely play.

In terms of rules, the differences between the Olympic and Paralympic curling competition are:

* No sweeping.

* Six ends instead of 10.

* No time clocks, but players must keep the game moving along, and officials will enforce this.

* Shots may be delivered anywhere before the nearer hog line (same as in able-bodied curling), from a stationary wheelchair, either directly by one's hand or using a handle extensive device (known commonly as a "stick"). The stone must be touching either side of the centerline at the time of delivery, however.

* Each team must be comprised of mixed gender, and at least one member of the opposite gender must be on the ice at all times, except in the instance of a medical condition preventing that player from competing.

With the absence of sweeping, the ability for all players to excel at a variety of shots is extremely important in wheelchair curling, especially since the skips need to be left with make-able shots. Thus, Brown has a nice problem in that all of his competitors seem to be performing on an equal plane at the moment.

"I keep looking for a magic formula to find the one person who's going to take charge, or the one person who's going to make more shots than anyone else," said Brown. "But you know, one day I think Wes is the best shot-maker, and the next day it's Jim, and then the next it's Goose. There really isn't a lot of difference between them, so now the big thing is just to keep them feeling and believing the team concept."

Indeed, during his rolling team meeting, Brown emphasized the fact that, while the skip's rocks will determine the outcome of an end, and often a game, all five players will win as a team or lose as a team.

From the few positive comments exchanged in the meeting and the looks of the athletes interacting on the ice, Brown doesn't have much to worry about as far as the team concept goes. "I love their attitudes and enthusiasm. They're like sponges, just so eager to learn," he said.

The Paralympic curling competition features a seven-game round robin with the top four teams advancing to semifinals on Friday, March 17. All eight teams will play two games a day Sunday through Tuesday, and finish the round robin with an 11 a.m. (local time) draw on Wednesday. Tiebreakers will be held Wednesday and Thursday as necessary.

The hands-down pre-tournament favorite is the Great Britain team, featuring five players who won the World Wheelchair Curling Championship in both 2004 and '05. They haven't been beaten in their last 17 games, and the core of this team also finished third in the 2002 world championship. USA will face the Brits in the round robin finale on Wednesday.

The U.S. team was selected at Paralympic Trials held in December in Utica, N.Y. The U.S. qualified for the Paralympics with a fifth-place finish at the World Wheelchair Curling Championship in 2004 and an eighth-place finish in 2005. USA finished fifth at the inaugural world championship held in 2002. No world championship was held in 2003.