Jones crew adjusts and overcomes

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 23/03/2009 (6270 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

GANGNEUNG, South Korea — In a non-traditional curling setting, it’s only fitting that Team Canada would face some non-traditional curling situations.

But that’s pretty much a standard-issue scenario when Canadian teams venture outside their borders, so Jennifer Jones and her Canadian champion teammates from Winnipeg, unbeaten through the opening weekend at the Mount Titlis world women’s championship and part of a three-way tie for first place with Sweden’s Anette Norberg and Denmark’s Camilla Jensen, are used to seeing different strategies, different philosophies and even different ways of throwing a curling rock.

“We just go out and do our own thing,” Jones said Sunday at the Gangneung International Ice Rink, as her team rolled to a pair of victories: 10-3 over Debbie McCormick of the U.S. and 8-5 over Russia’s Liudmilla Privivkova. “Really, the idea is just to make more shots than them. And hope we don’t call too many silly ones.”

The Russians, who pushed Canada hard Sunday night, taking three in the second to go up by a point before surrendering a three back to Canada in the sixth, are constantly tinkering with their lineup, going as far as benching Privivkova for their afternoon game on Sunday, a 9-3 loss to China’s Bingyu Wang.

“It’s definitely interesting because it’s not something we’re used to,” Jones said. “I mean, I think I would have a hard time playing in that kind of environment when you don’t know whether you’re in the game or what position you’ll be playing. But to each their own. They are successful with that and I guess that’s what they’re used to. I actually asked them what their lineup was before the game; you never know.”

It’s also telling that unlike when they’re playing domestic competitions against teams that have similar ways of throwing stones, which helps when it comes to reading the ice, there’s nothing that can be gleaned from the way most Europeans deliver rocks.

Where Canadians will throw with a purer, more positive (directly at the target) release, Europeans tend to manipulate their releases to start the rocks curling before they’ve actually been released.

That works better on the straight ice they typically play on at home, but it’s far less predictable on swingy arena ice, and next to impossible to learn from for an opponent.

“Oh, God, you could never do that (set the target based on what an opponent’s rock did),” said Jones’ third, Cathy Overton-Clapham. “And that’s a learning thing over the years. There’s no way rocks will run the same or end up in the same spot.”

“Our rocks definitely react differently than a lot of the teams,” Jones added. “We basically just don’t watch, and pay attention to our own ice, and that seems to be working so far.”

Jones wasn’t at her best against Russia, and was sitting in the low 50s in percentage midway through before rallying over the later ends to finish at 72 per cent.

“We didn’t play very well in three of the middle ends, and when we gave up that three (in the second end), we had six misses in a row, which is very uncharacteristic of us,” Jones said. “It’s just getting used to the ice and rocks, and we didn’t adjust as quickly tonight. We’ll definitely have to be sharper, but we always want to get better as the week goes on.”

Jones did make a couple of nice shots that led to multiple points. In the first end, she made a delicate come-around tap to score a game-opening deuce.

And in the fourth, a perfect hit-and-roll left the Canadians sitting five behind cover. Privivkova was forced into attempting a cold draw to the four-foot and came up heavy to leave three Canadian rocks counting.

That Russia was even in position to be in the game was thanks to a Jones miss in the second when her last rock overcurled and bumped into the open, giving Privivkova a shot at four. Her delivery also overcurled and she had to settle for three.

“I actually thought we played very well after that,” said Jones, who today takes on Scotland’s Eve Muirhead (2-1) and Norway’s Marianne Rorvik (0-3). “We ended the game very well and hopefully we carry that to (Monday).”

— Canwest News Service

Up next for Canada

Canada vs. Scotland, 1 a.m. CT

Canada vs. Norway, 6 a.m. CT

Check our website for world curling championship updates.

www.winnipegfreepress.com