It lost its first game at the Maniototo Curling International rink yesterday when beaten 6-4 by Korea.
It was a tightly fought clash, with Korean skip Lee Dong-Keun winning the game with his last stone on the extra end.
The scores were level at 4-all after nine ends and it was a battle of stone for stone on the extra end.
New Zealand skip Sean Becker's second-last rock stopped on the edge of the inner red circle.
Korean skip Dong-Keun attempted to draw on top of Becker's stone for the shot.
"I tried to bump that stone back and sit to the left," Becker said.
"I wanted to force him into a draw against two of our rocks."
Dong-Keun played an accurate weighted shot with his last stone to push out the New Zealand shot to win the game by two shots.
"It's always tough when you come to the 10th end and lose the game with the last rock after a game that lasts nearly three hours," Becker said.
The New Zealand team for the game was Warren Dobson, Rupert Jones, Scott Becker and Sean Becker (skip).
The home team has performed above expectations and shares the lead after three days with Korea.
Each has four wins.
China, the defending champion, has three wins, Australia and Japan two, and Chinese-Taipei has lost its five games.
New Zealand has beaten Japan 6-4, China 9-8, Australia 8-7, and Chinese-Taipei 9-2.
Korea has beaten Australia 5-4, Chinese-Taipei 13-1, China 8-3 and New Zealand 6-4.
It lost to Japan 6-10.
China beat Chinese-Taipei 13-3, Australia 5-2 , and Japan 8-4 yesterday.
It has lost to New Zealand 8-9 and Korea 3-8.
"It is nice to get this foothold from the start," Sean Becker said.
"But there is still a long way to go.
"We must keep our expectations at a reasonable level because we still have to play everyone again in the round robin. We will just take one game at a time."
It is a significant performance by the New Zealand team because China beat Australia in the final of last year's Pacific championships.
China went on to finish fourth at the world championships and Australia sixth.
Both China and Australia expect to make the Vancouver Winter Olympics in 2010.
But they need to get to the world championships to do so.
The top two teams qualify for the world championships.
In the other men's game yesterday, Australia beat Chinese-Taipei 10-3.
China's coach, Daniel Rafael, has not been happy with the form of the Chinese team.
"Our players have been thinking too much about the outcome of qualifying for the worlds and the Olympics rather than taking it game by game.
"They are putting too much pressure on themselves and thinking ahead too much."
The round robin competition will be completed on Friday and followed by the best-of-five semifinals.
The two round robin games between the semifinalists count for the five games.
The men's and women's finals will start at 12.55pm on Sunday.
