John Shuster might have just earned a new nickname: Uncle Buck.

USA Curling announced its overhauled national program teams last week under the watch of newly appointed high performance director Brad Gushue.

Shuster's team got a complete makeover, as the 2018 Olympic gold medallist will now play with the "Young Bucks" of Andrew Stopera, Mark Fenner and Lance Wheeler.

Here’s a look at some of the lineups, plus other tidbits, in this week’s Eight Ends.

First End: For Shuster, this is what starting over feels like. Shuster is coming off one of the most successful tour seasons of his career, finishing No. 6 in the world rankings, one spot ahead of fellow American Danny Casper. However, it was a "last dance" season for third Chris Plys and second Colin Hufman as both were stepping back once it was over. While that was expected, it was a surprise to see Shuster getting an entirely new lineup. It stings that lead Matt Hamilton was left out, as he was the last holdover from Shuster’s 2018 Olympic squad, but he will remain in the national program for mixed doubles.

Shuster will have his work cut out for him. Stopera's squad finished last season No. 45 in the world rankings, and while Shuster’s share of points should give them a boost, it will not be enough to crack the top tier to start. The Satellite Events system and winning one of those tour events could be Shuster's ticket to fast-track back into the Grand Slams.

Second End: Don’t mess with something that works. Casper returns with his group that represented the U.S. at the Winter Olympics: Luc Violette, Ben Richardson and Aidan Oldenburg.

The team had a meteoric rise and was one of the biggest surprises of the last quad. With Casper now among the elite ranks, can his team stay there and take the next step to contend for Grand Slam titles? The U.S. hasn’t had a men's team reach a Grand Slam final or even a men's team that has made frequent playoff appearances for that matter. Casper has the potential to change that, but first things first: make one Grand Slam playoff appearance.

One to watch over the next quad on the men's side is their junior squad skipped by Caden Hebert. The reigning world junior champs could be the next Team Casper.

Third End: Five women’s teams were named to the program, compared to three on the men’s side, but that’s by design. Tabitha Peterson's Olympic team is not playing next season, while reigning U.S. champ Delaney Strouse has also stepped back for now. Both of those were obviously factors in the need to spread development resources, presenting the opportunity for someone, anyone, to step up.

It's similar to British Curling's situation, with three top men's teams but lacking a legit threat in the women's division at the moment. Where they differ is British Curling has focused its program on one women's team, skipped by Fay Henderson, whereas the U.S. has cast a wide net. That could change if/when Peterson returns down the line. For now, it's a free-for-all fight to the top.

Elizabeth Cousins retained her lineup from last season and might have the inside track as the runner-up in the Olympic trials and national championship. Former Team Strouse third Anne O'Hara will now be skipping her own squad. It'll be a tough adjustment, but O'Hara has more experience playing against the top teams than other skips in the program.

One other thing to note: Taylor Anderson-Heide, who played lead for Team Peterson, is expected to return to the ice in December after recovering from shoulder surgery. If all is well, she'll be good to go for Rock League Season 2 in the new year with Frontier Curling Club.

Fourth End: Mixed doubles is the biggest strength for the U.S., led by Olympic silver medallists Cory Thiesse and Korey Dropkin. Both are focusing on the discipline next season — something we should see more of in the future as the mixed doubles tour continues to expand and Rock League also provides an avenue for athletes to make it a viable path.

As mentioned, Matt Hamilton will play mixed doubles with his sister Becca. The Hamilton siblings should challenge Thiesse and Dropkin as they are three-time national champions and represented the U.S. at Pyeongchang 2018. Madison Bear and Aidan Oldenburg are the least experienced of the three mixed doubles teams, but don’t overlook them as they finished third at the Olympic trials.

Of the three disciplines, mixed doubles is where we could see the most growth in the U.S. Dropkin has talked about how 20 years ago, he watched the U.S. men’s team win bronze at the Winter Olympics in Turin and how it inspired him to become a curler. How many future curlers watched Dropkin win silver in Milano Cortina?

Fifth End: Overseas, we might be seeing a "changing of the guard" moment at the top of the Japanese women’s curling scene.

Their national championships were held earlier this month, with the women’s final coming down to Miyu Ueno scoring three in the 10th end to defeat Miku Nihira 7-6. Although this was Ueno’s second national title in three seasons, the Japanese women's curling scene has been led for years by two-time Olympic medallist Satsuki Fujisawa and 2026 Olympic rep Sayaka Yoshimura. With Yoshimura announcing her retirement and Fujisawa’s longtime third Chinami Yoshida stepping back, there’s an opening here for Ueno, 25, and Nihira, 23, to step up.

We haven’t seen Ueno in the top tier of the Grand Slams yet, but Nihira has been a regular for two seasons now, skipping Team Tabata, and made the semifinals of the HearingLife Canadian Open back in December.

Sixth End: Moving over to South Korea, where their season has already started, Eun-ji Gim won the women’s national title for the fourth consecutive year, scoring three in the 10th end to defeat You-been Park 7-5 in the final.

There was quite the musical chairs shuffle among the Korean women's teams during the off-season, including Park, who essentially took over as skip of Seung-youn Ha's Chuncheon City team. Interestingly enough, Park eliminated Ha's new Gangneung City team in the semifinals.

Team Gim was the only top club unaffected by the changes. Perhaps it was a bit unfair for the new teams to play their first event together in a national championship, but Gim remains the gold standard and for a good reason. The world No. 5 crew has a Grand Slam title win and probably would have gone deep a couple times last season if not for trouble with Team Tirinzoni, losing to the Swiss squad twice in semifinals and once in a quarterfinal in the series. We'll see if that continues to be the case now that Silvana Tirinzoni has retired and vice skip Alina Pätz has returned to calling the shots.

Two-time reigning world junior champ Bo-bae Kang was one of the favourites to win the Korean title, but her team missed the playoffs entirely and notably lost a round-robin game via disqualification for apparently submitting an incorrect lineup ahead of the match. Kang was up 4-1 after three ends and should have gone on to win against the Songhyun High School team, skipped by A-yeon Kim, when the game was called. I can’t blame them for having such a rule — one of my curling "airing of grievances" is when teams change their lineups at tour events without informing everyone — although an outright forfeit seems like a harsh penalty.

That mistake proved costly as Kang finished in a three-way tie with Park and Ji-yoon Kim for the final two playoff spots. Head-to-head was inconclusive, with all three teams knotted at 1-1, so Kang was eliminated based on last stone draw numbers.

Seventh End: Rock League put out a post, just for fun, asking who you would like to see play during Season 2 in 2027. You can have your say by clicking here.

One name I'll throw in the hat is Dean Hewitt of Australia. Hewitt is fresh off of winning gold at the World Mixed Doubles Curling Championship with Tahli Gill, who is taking next season off. The pair also won bronze in the event last year and just missed the Olympic Winter Games in Milano Cortina, losing the final qualifier game to South Korea.

Considering how key mixed doubles were in winning Rock League matches during Season 1 — the winner of the pre-match coin flip received the hammer to start mixed doubles and only one of the men's or women's games — who wouldn't want the reigning world champ?

Eighth End: Now's the time to dig through your family tree for Dutch ancestry. Team Gösgens from the Netherlands put out a call on social media looking for a potential new teammate. Since my world revolves around curling and F1, I wonder if Max Verstappen needs a winter hobby?