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The Canadian Press - ONLINE EDITION
Canadian skip Rachel Homan opens world women's curling championship with a loss
Canada's skip Rachel Homan releases a stone against Scotland at the world women's curling championship in Riga, Latvia on Saturday, March 16, 2013. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Andrew Vaughan
RIGA, Latvia - Canada's Rachel Homan dropped a 6-4 decision to Scotland's Eve Muirhead on Saturday in the round-robin opener for both teams at the world women's curling championship.
Homan's rink fell behind early and never had the lead. Canada tied the game in the seventh end but Scotland scored one in the eighth and stole another point in the ninth.
"We made several mistakes, probably way more than we normally make," Homan said. "We'll learn from them and play much better next game."
Homan shot just 73 per cent on the day, well behind Muirhead at 92 per cent. Scotland shot 81 per cent as a team to 74 per cent for Canada.
Homan and her teammates from the Ottawa Curling Club are making their first appearance at the tournament. They won gold at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts last month in Kingston, Ont., by defeating Manitoba's Jennifer Jones in the championship game.
Canada is scheduled to play Denmark and host Latvia on Sunday. Round-robin play will continue through Thursday, with the medal games set for March 24.
Muirhead was aggressive early and forced Homan to go for a triple takeout with her final throw of the first end. The Canadian skip managed to clear two stones and Muirhead came through with a draw for a 2-0 lead.
Canada gave up another point in the second end after Alison Kreviazuk burned a rock. The Canadian second lost her balance while sweeping and her knee touched the stone as she fell to the ice.
Homan finally got on the board in the fifth end. She used her last-rock advantage to draw inside the four-foot to score a pair.
Muirhead padded her lead in the sixth end with a takeout to score one but Homan came through with a tricky takeout for two to pull even.
The Scottish skip — a four-time world junior champion — took the lead again with a single in the eighth end.
Canada then had an error-filled ninth end and it proved costly. Kreviazuk and third Emma Miskew were both visibly frustrated with their efforts and Homan also had trouble.
Miskew had an unlucky pick and Homan couldn't get past a guard with her first stone. Her second throw was heavy to allow Scotland to steal one.
A couple hundred fans were in attendance in the cosy 1,000-seat Volvo Sports Center. There are just a few rows of seating on either side of the ice.
Homan skipped Canada to a silver medal at the 2010 world junior championships. She is hoping to win Canada's first world women's title since Jones won in 2008.
Edmonton skip Heather Nedohin finished third at last year's world championship in Lethbridge, Alta. Switzerland's Mirjam Ott beat Margaretha Sigfridsson of Sweden for the 2012 title.
There were some high-scoring games in the opening draw Saturday. American Erika Brown dumped Italy's Diana Gaspari 10-3 and two-time world champion Andrea Schopp of Germany outscored Russia's Anna Sidorova 11-9.
Denmark's Lene Nielsen topped China's Bingyu Wang 11-4 and Switzerland's Silvana Tirinzoni edged Japan's Satsuki Fujisawa 7-6.
In the evening, Sigfridsson opened with a 7-4 win over Latvia's Iveta Stasa-Satsune and Tirinzoni whipped Italy 9-3 to sit on top of the leaderboard at 2-0. Russia beat China 6-4 in the other late game.
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