No shortcuts for Team Canada

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This article was published 24/03/2023 (1012 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Canada’s Kerri Einarson must take the long road at the World Women’s Curling Championship in Sandviken, Sweden.

The Gimli skip finished the 12-game round robin with a 7-5 record after going 1-1 on Friday. She started the day with a 10-4 decision over Turkey’s Dilsat Yildiz before a backbreaking 11-5 loss to Denmark’s Madeleine Dupont. If Einarson had beaten Dupont, Canada would’ve earned a bye to the semi-final as the No. 2 seed.

Instead, Einarson, third Val Sweeting, second Shannon Birchard and lead Briane Harris had to settle for third place in the 13-team event and a date with Satsuki Fujisawa of Japan in the first round of playoffs Saturday at 4 a.m. CT.

Switzerland’s Silvana Tirinzoni, who went a perfect 12-0 in round-robin play, and Norway’s Marianne Roervik (8-4) earned the first-round byes for finishing in first and second place.

The other first round match-up will see Italy’s Stefania Constantini challenging Sweden’s Anna Hasselborg. Canada, Italy, Sweden, and Japan all finished at 7-5, but since Einarson had a 2-1 record against those teams, she was given the advantage in the tiebreaker and awarded the No. 3 seed.

The United States and Turkey ended up just outside the playoff picture at 6-6.

“Well, considering we went through the emotions of possibly not being in, we’re definitely grateful to still have a chance,” Sweeting told the Free Press late Friday. “We would’ve liked to have been in that No. 2 spot, but we’re still happy to have a chance.”

Einarson and Co. have lost two of their last three games, including a 6-5 loss to Japan on Thursday. They’ve lacked consistency all week and have yet to play a game to their full potential.

According to Sweeting, the four-time Scotties champions still like their chances.

“We have that confidence. I know there’s been some uncharacteristic situations for us out there, but we’re not alone. This could happen to all the teams out there. We’re just gonna do the best that we can, stick together, support each other, figure out what the sheet’s doing, and leave it all out there,” said Sweeting.

The loss to Denmark wasn’t pretty with Canada curling at 76 per cent. The Danes scored three in the third, three in the fifth, and four in the eighth to run away with the contest.

“We had a great start to the game and then in the third end we just let them off the hook. They played well, to their credit, making some fantastic freezes, chases and draws. We just weren’t responding in that sense,” Birchard said.

Einarson owns a career 16-9 record against Fujisawa but is winless against the Japanese squad in their last three meetings.

“We’re a really good rebound team, a really good bounce back team. There’s been ups and downs throughout the week, but we’re definitely prepared to just shake it off and come out strong tomorrow. We’ve played Japan a lot this season so we know it’s going to be a really close game, but we’re definitely prepared and going to fight for everything we can out there.”

Tirinzoni, the reigning three-time world champion, has won 33 straight games at the event dating back to 2021. Fortunately for Einarson, if they get past Japan, they’ll play Norway — who they beat 9-6 earlier in the week — in the final four. The semi-finals take place at 10 a.m. CT. The championship game will be played on Sunday at 8 a.m. CT.

taylor.allen@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @TaylorAllen31