Fleury gains Scotties final

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This article was published 27/01/2019 (2635 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

GIMLI — There were no easy ends. On two sheets, it came right down to the wire. But when the last rocks finally settled, the championship picture at the 2019 Manitoba Scotties Tournament of Hearts looked a lot clearer.

Former Northern Ontario champion Tracy Fleury, is on her way to a Manitoba final. Veteran Darcy Robertson slipped down to the semi, where she’ll get a second crack at making this afternoon’s championship game.

For Fleury, recruited to skip this season for the Manitoba-based team of Selena Njegovan, Liz Fyfe and Kristin MacCuish, the win was a welcome reversal of their round-robin meeting with Robertson, which Fleury had lost.

“It’s really exciting,” Fleury said, moments after she beat Robertson 8-6 in the top 1-vs-2 Page playoff game. “I’m really proud of the team, they’ve played really well all week, and hopefully we can keep it going tomorrow.”

Then there is top seed and Gimli hometown hero Kerri Einarson. She was pushed to the limit in the 3-vs-4 game by rookie Abby Ackland, but with her buffalo hopes twisting in the balance, she found the shots to dig out a 6-4 victory.

Now, for the second year in a row, Einarson will face Robertson in the provincial semifinal. Last time, she fell. This time, she’ll be gunning to flip that result — and if Saturday night was a teaser trailer, it should be spectacular show.

Both games were thrillers, defined by volleys of sharp shots, heartbreaking misses and electrifying tension. Fleury spoke about the pressure that Robertson brought; and Einarson had her hands full holding back Ackland’s attack.

“It was a battle out there,” Einarson said, after sealing the win with a 10th end deuce. “Abby’s team made a lot of nice shots and so did she… you can’t take that away from them.”

At this stage of the provincials, the high drama is a good thing. Einarson, third Val Sweeting, second Shannon Birchard and lead Briane Meilleur did their best curling of the week on Saturday, just in time for the games to matter.

“You always want to have close games and have that pressure going into the final two games,” Einarson agreed.

The night marked the end of the line for Ackland, a 24-year-old Scotties rookie. Her team was the talk of the bonspiel in Gimli: they had to play most of the round robin without the skip, who started Winnipeg paramedic training this week.

In her absence, third Hailey Ryan, second Emilie Rafnson and lead Sara Oliver collected key upset wins with fill-in skips. When Ackland came back, they promptly won a tiebreaker against Beth Peterson to reach the 3-vs-4 game.

Ackland had said she hoped to build a name for herself at these Scotties. Well, mission accomplished.

“It was a great experience overall,” Ackland said, after the loss. “We got to the playoffs which is really good for my first Scotties… we’re going to take a lot of knowledge from this experience and work with that and try to get better.”

(By the way, this was also fine Scotties for Peterson, the 2015 Manitoba junior champ. She went a respectable 4-3 in her provincial Scotties debut in 2017; here in Gimli, she made a strong case for herself as a surging talent to watch.)

Meanwhile, in a different system, maybe Einarson wouldn’t have ended up in the 3-vs-4 game. The familiar old format, where the top two teams in each pool advanced to playoffs, would have seen her join the 1-vs-1 game.

Yet this year, under the new format unveiled for some Manitoba playoffs, the top four teams in the whole field advance, despite playing in different pools. Cumulative pre-game draw to the button results help fix placement.

It’s supposed to ensure the best four teams make the playoffs. But if it fixes that problem, perhaps it creates a whole new set: it didn’t feel right that Einarson landed in the 3-vs-4 with a 6-1 record due to, essentially, a skills competition.

Einarson had already beaten Ackland, when they faced each other in the round robin. And Robertson had already bested Fleury. Shouldn’t those facts have earned them something other than a rematch, early in the Page playoff?

Minutes before the playoffs, curling media announced their picks for the 2019 Manitoba Scotties all-star team.

Heading up the list is Robertson, whose steady hand helped make her a quiet sensation this week. Ackland third Hailey Ryan made the cut, for her efforts keeping her team building momentum despite a revolving door of skips.

Einarson second Shannon Birchard and Fleury lead Kristin MacCuish rounded out the all-star nods.

The 2019 Manitoba Scotties Tournament of Hearts continues today, with a 9 a.m. semifinal and the championship game set for 3 p.m. Both will be televised live on Sportsnet, with Olympian Jill Officer delivering colour commentary.

 

melissa.martin@freepress.mb.ca