REGINA — Brendan Bottcher operates without a safety net. He believes that is the secret to his curling team's success at the Canadian men's curling championship.

Each team usually has an alternate player and a coach sitting on chairs at the end of the ice sheet during games at major curling championships.

Alberta's chairs have been empty at the Tim Hortons Brier in Regina. Bottcher, third Darren Moulding, second Brad Thiessen and lead Karrick Martin prefer to go it alone.

The Edmonton foursome will play Sunday's semifinal at the Brier. Bottcher upset upset Northern Ontario's Brad Jacobs 6-5 in an extra end in Saturday's playoff game.

"We just felt like this year we needed to own it the four of us and see where that could take us," Bottcher said.

Defending champion Brad Gushue and Ontario's John Epping squared off in a later playoff Saturday between the top two seeds.

The winner advances to Sunday's championship. The loser needs to beat Alberta to gain a rematch in the final.

Gushue went 10-1 and Epping 9-2 to gain the first and second playoff seeds, followed by Bottcher and Jacobs both at 8-3.

Trailing 5-3 coming home with hammer against Jacobs, Bottcher made a tricky double takeout to score two and send the game into an extra end.

Instead of hitting and giving Jacobs a makeable draw for the win in the extra end, Bottcher tucked a draw behind cover on the back edge of the button.

Jacobs didn't make enough contact with that stone and gave up the steal of one.

"(Bottcher's draw) was a phenomenal shot," Jacobs said. "I didn't think he was making that shot. That was a ridiculously tough shot, and he made it look easy.

"We didn't execute. It's too bad we weren't able to close this one out."

The Jacobs team won Canadian and world titles in 2013 and Olympic gold the following year. Bottcher's current team went 3-8 in their Brier debut last year in St. John's, N.L.

But Alberta won their second game in as many days against one of this year's tournament favourites having beaten Northern Ontario 9-3 the previous day.

"To be the underdogs, no one expects . . . there wouldn't have been a whole lot of teams that would have placed us in the final three," Bottcher said.

"I think we'll be underdogs against the last two and I like our chances still."

Kevin Martin, father of lead Karrick and skip of the team that won Olympic gold in 2010, coached the team last year in St. John's where the team also had an alternate player.

Bottcher, a 26-year-old chemical engineer, wanted to put more responsibility in fewer hands this season.

"We're a pretty tight-knit group," he explained. "There's a lot of teams here at the Brier that all have their own rooms, they have their coach, their alternate, they come play their games and they all go their own way and that's not really our team.

"We're together a lot and we found that when the onus is on us to come here and scout rocks and to do evening practices together, we're just a lot better unit."

Added Moulding: "We all fit in one vehicle which is nice."

Going without a fifth player means no replacement player in the event of illness or injury. Northern Ontario lead Ryan Harnden was back in their lineup Saturday after missing two games Friday with the flu.

"It was a little bit of a risk, but it was a risk we were willing to take," Moulding said. "We took the gamble we would all be healthy and we have been."