A certain Jenny sais quoi

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This article was published 28/02/2009 (6321 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

VICTORIA — She’s been there, up close, for all of Jennifer Jones’s finest moments.

The in-off for the Canadian title in St.

John’s in 2005. The clutch draw against Sherry Middaugh in the semifinal at the Scotties in Re­gina last year. The superlative final two rocks against Shannon Kleibrink in that final. The perfect freeze in the 10th end of the world semifinal against Japan in Vernon.

Put together, it is a body of work that has earned Jones the reputation as one of the greatest — maybe even the greatest — clutch shot-makers in the history of women’s curling.

And yet there are times even now — times like the 10th and 11th ends against P.E.I. Friday — that longtime Jones third Cathy Overton-Clapham admits even she stands back, like the rest of us, and marvels.

“It’s really quite unbelievable to hold the broom and watch that come down,” Overton­Clapham said Friday after her skip authored yet another unlikely comeback to defeat P.E.I.

6-5 in a tiebreaker game at the 2009 Scotties Tournament of Hearts.

“I don’t know what it is. When Jen needs to make a big one, she does — everytime,” said Overton-Clapham. “There’s a lot of pressure. If she doesn’t make the one in the 10th, we lose. If she doesn’t make the one in the 11th… They had to be perfect.

“You couldn’t have brought them down the ice and put them in a better spot.”

And because you couldn’t have hand-placed those final two rocks Jones threw yesterday, because they were both fully buried, on the button, Jones, Overton-Clapham and the rest of Team Canada has lived to fight another day.

The defending champions, just like they did last year, have limped their way into the play­offs through a tiebreaker game and will now take on Saskatchewan’s Stefanie Lawton this afternoon in the Page playoff 3 vs. 4 game (1:30 p.m., TSN).

The winner advances to tonight’s semifinal, while the loser is eliminated.

Jones won’t have the hammer against Sas­katchewan, but she will have that intangible edge — that maddening ability to turn every game into heart-stopping live theatre which always ends the same way, with the protagonist appearing on stage, just when all seems lost, and saving the day.

“We keep getting ourselves in these pos­itions,” said Canada second Jill Officer, “and that’s obviously not the positions we want to be in.

“But when we do get in those tough spots, we just know that if we can string eight shots together, if we can give Jen a shot, that we have a chance.”

The “position” Friday was down by one with­out the hammer coming home for the 10th end.

Needing a steal to tie the game, Jones chose to draw the button cold with the final rock of the 10th end. It was a precarious call, coming just one end after Jones needed to draw paint for a game-tying deuce, but could only catch the smallest bite and had to settle for one with the hammer.

But with her title defence on the line, Jones made no mistake in the 10th end. And then threw the exact same shot in the extra end to force P.E.I. vice-skip Robyn MacPhee to try once again to come around a centre-guard and pluck Jones’s counter off the button.

MacPhee was closer with the second effort, but she still rolled a fraction too far — Jones estimated a “quarter-inch” too far — and Jones once again had found a way to win.

The skip emerged from the ice to proclaim the entire experience delightful.

“We’re having fun. It’s so much fun to play in the big games and the pressure — that’s what we practise everyday for,” said Jones.

So is that it? Is that how Jones does it? She practises making us all crazy?

Even better, Overton-Clapham says. “We put eyes on her rocks today.”

The eyes had it. And so does Jones. Again. paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca