Gushue back in form, Jones falls again in round-robin curling play at the Olympics

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This article was published 12/02/2022 (1672 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

BEIJING – Canada’s Jennifer Jones didn’t lose a game in her first Olympic appearance in 2014.

She’s having difficulty avoiding defeats in her return to the Winter Games eight years later.

Jones extended her losing skid to three games on Sunday by dropping an 8-4 decision to Switzerland’s Silvana Tirinzoni. The result essentially left Canada (1-3) in must-win territory for the rest of the round-robin schedule.

“I believe in her and I believe in this team and we all believe in each other,” said Canadian coach Viktor Kjell. “So I look forward to tomorrow. It’s going to be a good day.”

Jones will play twice on Monday at the Ice Cube. She’s scheduled to take on Russia’s Alina Kovaleva in the morning and Great Britain’s Eve Muirhead in the evening.

It’s possible — although unlikely — that Jones could still make the four-team playoff cut with a fourth loss.

Jones had some momentum against the unbeaten Swiss side after a force in the seventh end. But she barely ticked a peel attempt in the eighth and gave up a steal of two.

Another steal of two followed in the ninth end and Jones was run out of rocks in the 10th.

“I missed a really bad shot in the eighth end that I wouldn’t normally miss,” Jones said. “Unfortunately it was the wrong time to do it.”

The Canadian back end of Kaitlyn Lawes and Jones has struggled over the first four games.

Jones is last among the 10 skips with a shooting percentage of 71.8, ranking her 39th out of the 40 players in the field. Lawes is ninth among thirds at 75.0 per cent.

Those numbers simply must improve for Canada to have any hope.

“I think Jennifer Jones was not hitting very well today, the way she’s usually hitting,” Tirinzoni said. “So she made a few mistakes there and that really helped (us).”

Canada has had a difficult schedule with an opening win over South Korea’s EunJung Kim followed by losses to Japan’s Satsuki Fujisawa, Sweden’s Anna Hasselborg and now Switzerland.

“I think we just have to play like we want to play and leave it all out there and then just see what happens,” Jones said.

In other games, Sweden dumped American Tabitha Peterson 10-4, Great Britain beat Denmark’s Madeleine Dupont 7-2 and China’s Yu Han edged South Korea 6-5 in an extra end.

Switzerland (5-0), Japan (3-1) own the first two spots in the standings.

Great Britain, Sweden and the U.S. were tied in third place at 3-2. South Korea was next at 2-2 and China was alone in seventh at 2-3.

Canada (1-3) was in eighth place, ahead of only Denmark (1-4) and Russia (0-4).

Head-to-head results are the first tiebreaker. Last stone draw statistics determine seeding if more than two teams are tied. Canada was seventh on that list after six sessions of play.

Earlier, Canada’s Brad Gushue took an early lead and never looked back in a confident 10-5 win over American John Shuster.

It was a solid bounceback effort after Gushue had an off-night in a loss to Sweden on Saturday.

“It’s been a long time since we’ve lost two in a row,” Gushue said. “We were itching to get back out on the ice and get a win.”

A four-point steal in the second end gave Canada full control.

Shuster, the defending Olympic champion, missed a runback and had his double-takeout attempt roll out to stake the Canadians to the big early lead.

Both teams made substitutions after the fifth-end break with Gushue up 7-1. Alternate Marc Kennedy came on for Canadian second Brett Gallant.

Normally a third for Team Brad Jacobs, Kennedy served as an assistant coach for Canada’s mixed doubles team here before moving into the fifth role.

The Americans scored three in the sixth end but Canada iced the win with a pair in the ninth.

Sweden held off Norway’s Steffen Walstad 6-4 to remain unbeaten at 5-0.

Great Britain’s Bruce Mouat edged China’s Xiuyue Ma 7-6 and Russia’s Sergey Glukhov defeated Italy’s Joel Retornaz 10-7.

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Great Britain moved into a second-place tie with Switzerland at 3-1. Canada was tied in fourth place with Russia.

The Americans fell into a sixth-place tie with China and Norway at 2-3. Denmark and Italy (0-4) remained winless.

Gushue was idle for the three-game men’s session in the evening.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 13, 2022.

Follow @GregoryStrongCP on Twitter.