Gushue is a six-time (1995, 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001) provincial junior curling champion in his home province of Newfoundland, the last five as skip. He finished with a bronze medal at the 1999 Canadian Junior Curling Championships, a silver medal at the 2000 Canadian Junior Curling Championships, and in 2001, he not only won the provincial championship but the 2001 Canadian Juniors and World Junior Championships as well. Gushue was also the alternate for John Morris at the 1998 World Junior Championships, which Morris won.
After his outstanding career as a junior, Gushue made an impressive transition into men's curling, and his team quickly became a competitive force. Gushue qualified for the 2003 Nokia Brier, where he finished with a 6–5 record. By the 2004 Nokia Brier, Gushue proved not only was he one of the best curlers in Newfoundland, but one of the best in Canada, when his team finished with an 8–4 record. The following year, Gushue qualified for the 2005 Tim Hortons Brier, where his team once again finished 6–5.
In May 2005, Gushue brought in former world champion Russ Howard as fifth man on the team to bring experience and advice for the Canadian Olympic trials. Shortly afterwards, second Mike Adam volunteered to step aside for Howard, as the team felt that Howard's skills and experience gave them the best chance to make it to the Olympics. Howard, playing as second, was given the right to call the team's shots as a skip would but would defer to Gushue for the final word on calls. (Under international rules, Howard was nominally the skip, holding the broom in the house and sweeping opponents' stones behind the tee line.) The personnel change was a success, as Gushue defeated Jeff Stoughton's team in the Olympic trials final on December 11, 2005, qualifying him to represent Canada at the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy. At the Olympics, he defeated surprise finalist Finland's Markku Uusipaavalniemi to win the gold medal.

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