Kevin Koe reacts after missing a shot in Sunday's final of the Grand Slam of Curling (Anil Mungal, Capital One)

The names Ferbey, Martin and Howard are firmly entrenched as elites in the minds of curling fans.

The name Kevin Koe is often mispronounced.

He'd like to change that.

As he stepped onto the ice for the championships final at the Grey Power World Cup of Curling in Mississauga, Ont., Koe wanted to shed his reputation as a bridesmaid.

Can a guy be a bridesmaid? It's as good a description as I can conjure for a team stuck in the runner-up spot. Prior to Sunday's final against Glenn Howard, Koe and Co. had made it to an impressive five Capital One Grand Slam of Curling finals… and won exactly zero.

Sure, they won last year's Canada Cup, but the Edmonton skip knows that to join curling's royalty, you need more than one big win.

"We just want to get the monkey off our back," Koe told me before Sunday's final.

It looked like the monkey would be gone after a rare air ball in the opening end from Howard resulted in a steal of two for Koe to open the scoring.

Flash forward to the sixth end, where a circus triple got Koe out of a jam and allowed him to score one for a single-point lead over Howard.

But here's what the Howard rink does so well: It never panics. It just quietly keeps doing its job. Howard scored two in the seventh and stole the win in the eighth to hand Koe another loss in a Grand Slam final.

More heartache.

My old team used to call those losses "character builders." If that's the case, Koe and his teammates have plenty of character going into December's Canadian Olympic trials in Edmonton.

Koe can take consolation in the fact that two of the last three skips to win the Canadian Olympic spot — Brad Gushue in 2006 and Mike Harris in 1998 — were not part of curling's elite. They were underdogs.

"It obviously doesn't hurt to go in not as the favourite to the trials," Koe said. "Slipping in behind Howard and [reigning Brier champion Kevin] Martin is probably a good thing. There'll be less pressure."

Koe and his team are too good not to break through any day now. Just not on this day.