For Jones, it’s good to be lucky

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This article was published 05/12/2017 (3042 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — Sometimes you’re good. Sometimes you’re lucky.

And every once in awhile, you’re Jennifer Jones.

Jones won a game here Tuesday afternoon at the Roar of the Rings in which she curled 63 per cent, which is to say Jones won a game she had no business winning.

But so it goes for Jones, who with Tuesday’s stolen — and I mean that both figuratively and literally — 8-7 extra-end victory over Lethbridge’s Casey Scheidegger improved to a perfect 5-0 at this event and has now won 19 games in a row this season.

Now, make no mistake: you don’t put together a streak like that just by getting lucky, although there was lots of that on display in Jones’ unlikely win over Scheidegger.

You have to be good and you have to be curling at a very high level to win 19 straight.

Jones has been all those things.

The numbers underlying her current streak tell the story: Jones has outscored her competition 150-81 through a streak that saw her team go a perfect 7-0 through the two Grand Slam events they won leading up to this event, followed by the 5-0 run she is now on.

Her average margin of victory over that period? Almost four points.

That’s an insanely dominant run, and it’s been like that all season.

While the current streak dates back to Jones’ last loss in late October, Jones has been crushing her competition since her squad first set foot on the ice in early September.

Her team’s season record is 42-11, a crazy .792 winning percentage that has set a new high-water mark for this foursome.

The team’s previous best winning percentage was .788, which came during the 2013-14 curling season.

You remember what else happened for the Jones team in the 2013-14 season? Exactly — Jones won the Roar of the Rings in Winnipeg and went on in Sochi to take down Olympic gold with a historic undefeated run through the women’s curling event.

All of which is to say that a Jones team that peaked at exactly the right time in 2013-14 appears to be doing exactly the same thing now, getting good and getting lucky at exactly the time the games mean the most.

Now, it needs to be said that it was decidedly more of the latter than the former against Scheidegger on Tuesday.

Warm, rainy weather outside Canadian Tire Centre led to frosty ice conditions inside — and bad ice conditions have always been the great equalizer in curling.

Scheidegger took full advantage, jumping out to a 4-1 lead by the fourth end and controlling the play. But just when it looked like a 29-year-old teacher most curling fans have never heard of was going to knock off the biggest name in the women’s game, Scheidegger turned back into, well, Scheidegger.

First, she rolled out on what would have been the winning shot of the tenth end to hand Jones a game-tying single. Then she crashed a mostly open hit with the last rock of the extra end to gift wrap Jones the victory.

“I’m really frustrated — we should have won that game,” Scheidegger said afterward.

I wish I had a nickel for every opposing skip I’ve heard say that over the years after letting Jones wriggle through their fingers.

And Jones? She knew she’d gotten lucky and wasn’t pretending otherwise. “We got fortunate to win that one. I didn’t play well enough. I will have to be better (Wednesday).”

Yeah, she will. And that’s because Jones’ opponent on Wednesday in her only game of the day will be a Chelsea Carey foursome that is the only other team also still undefeated at 4-0.

Carey has been superb this week — and so too has her third, Cathy Overton-Clapham.

Remember that name? Of course you do. Overton-Clapham won four Canadian titles with Jones, only to be fired in 2010 and replaced with Kaitlyn Lawes.

You may recall that made for some hard feelings between the two women, to put it mildly. While both parties have been saying for years that they’re over it, you’re delusional if you don’t think a game already dripping with huge implications won’t also have a little extra meaning given the history that will be at play Wednesday afternoon (1 p.m. CT, TSN).

First place is huge at this event. Unlike other Canadian events where the Page Playoff format is in place and you have to win a 1 vs. 2 game to get to the final, the first-place team here after the round robin ends on Friday gets an automatic bye to Sunday’s final, where they’ll need just one more win to punch a ticket to the Olympics.

With Carey and Jones the only undefeated teams remaining, there’s an excellent chance that whoever wins on Wednesday will finish first and draw that coveted bye.

Jones will need to be good. She will also need to be lucky.

But mostly, she’ll need to be Jennifer Jones.

It’s worked so far.

email: paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @PaulWiecek