Canada within shouting distance of lead Doing things the hard way

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This article was published 22/02/2011 (5655 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

CHARLOTTETOWN — For all her tremendous success on the ice over the years, Jennifer Jones has never done things the easy way.

In 2008, she needed to win seven straight games to win the Canadian women’s curling championship. In 2005, it took one of the greatest shots in the history of Canadian curling to win.

And should she go on to win her fifth Canadian title, it will take overcoming what has been an inauspicious start.

Jones recorded her second loss in three games Monday night, falling 8-6 to a Prince Edward Island team that was a lowly 1-3 coming into the game.

The loss dropped Canada’s record to 3-2, with tough tests still to come in B.C.’s Kelly Scott today, undefeated Ontario Wednesday and Alberta on the final round-robin Thursday night.

Oh, and a Wednesday night game against a Manitoba skip in Cathy Overton-Clapham, who has built a season around the desire to hang an anchor around Jones’s neck.

Perhaps because she has been through this scenario so often before, Jones was almost blasé Monday night about the challenge in front of her team, who head into today in a three-way tie for third place with Alberta’s Shannon Kleibrink and Nova Scotia’s Heather Smith-Dacey.

“We’ve got to be sharper (today),” says Jones. “But that’s OK. We’re still hanging in. 3-2 is OK, better than 2-3.”

Much better still would be 5-0, which is where Ontario’s Rachel Homan and Saskatchewan’s Amber Holland find themselves today — a full two games ahead of the rest of the field.

Homan, the 2010 Canadian junior champion, is just 21 years old and a bit brash. “We can play better,” Homan pledged last night. “There’s definitely more to come, there’s more in the bag.”

Homan’s also gotten lucky. She got a break in the first end of her 6-5 win over B.C. Monday night when an Ontario rock that appeared to be out of the rings was actually in the rings when it was measured, giving Ontario a phantom point of sorts and establishing that the rings on Sheet C — and who knows where else — have been inaccurately painted.

Canada’s loss to P.E.I.’s Suzanne Birt was much more straightforward. A four-ender by P.E.I. in the seventh end simply snuck up on Jones after one poorly placed rock after another, while a steal of two by P.E.I. the very next end was the result of a flash by Jones on a very thin double-takeout effort that would have earned her a deuce if she’d made it.

Canada’s loss to P.E.I. Monday night came after a 9-3 win earlier in the day over New Brunswick.

It was the only victory of the day for either Manitoba-based team. Team Manitoba’s Cathy Overton-Clapham lost her only game on Monday 7-6 to Quebec to fall to 1-4.

Overton-Clapham will need to almost certainly win all six of her remaining round-robin games to have any chance of making the playoffs.

Manitoba plays Nova Scotia this morning and Alberta tonight. Jones gets B.C. this morning and Newfoundland (1-4) this afternoon.

paul.wiecek@freepress.mb.ca

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