Val Sweeting admits she checked out the standings at the BTK Tires and OK Tire World Women’s Curling Championship before her Canadian team took on Team USA Thursday morning at CN Centre.
If she looks again she can’t help but notice there’s only one team ahead of Canada in the 13-team event and that certainly bodes well with playoffs looming on Saturday.
With a near-perfect display of curling, Sweeting, Canada’s third, helped solidify Canada’s second-place standing Thursday with a convincing 9-3 win over the Americans. It was Canada’ fifth-straight victory and left the host team with a 7-2 record, tied with Sweden, who Canada defeated on Wednesday.
Switzerland, the two-time defending world champions, lead the standings with a 9-0 record.
“Three games left and a lot can happen in that time so we definitely want to stay in the moment and not get ahead of ourselves,” said Sweeting, whose team got off to 2-2 start after the first two days. “It’s in our hands to put ourselves in a really good position and we just need to keep that going.
“I know we were a little up and down early, results-wise, but it felt a lot closer than it looked and I think we just trusted that. I think the girls have such a good bead on the ice and Kerri (skip Einarson) is reading it really well and it’s just resulting in a lot of great shots being made.”
That certainly was the case in their game against the Americans.
Sweeting, who improved her shot-making from 74 per cent her first three games to 93 per cent in her next three heading into Thursday’s game, continued to hold a hot hand and she helped set up a first-end steal for Canada with her second-shot freeze. Einarson’s confident in-turn draw tapped in for shot rock and American skip Cory Christensen wrecked off a guard to allow Canada to draw first blood.
The Americans had a couple of double take-out opportunities that went for singles and that set up a steal of two for Canada in the second end. Einarson drew to the side of the button on her second shot and Christensen missed on her takeout
Canada’s thievery continued in the third end. Einarson made a pinpoint draw to tap the U.S. stone that was on the button but didn’t quite move it far enough for shot rock. Christensen, trying to get within one on the scoreboard, drew through a minefield of narrow openings to get through to tap Canada out of the way but hit one of her own and both red rocks were punched out, leaving Einarson’s yellow in for another steal and a 4-0 lead.
Sweeting and second Shannon Birchard came close to a perfect game, each finishing 97 per cent. No player has gone perfect in a game at the world women’s event since Jill Officer threw 100 percent playing on the Jennifer Jones rink in 2018 in North Bay, Ont. A year ago in Calgary, at the world event, the Einarson rink’s shot-making abilities were not up to what they had come to expect.
“I think we’re super comfortable and I think that’s really played into how we’ve been out there on the ice,” said Birchard. “I think we play best when we’re relaxed and we’re having fun and enjoying ourselves and I think that’s really been the case out there. Briane (Canada’s lead Meilleur) has been setting up her two almost perfect almost every end and that just makes everyone’s job up the lineup easier and we just want to continue doing what we’re doing.
“It’s night and day compared to last year at this point. We’re really enjoying ourselves, whereas last year (after 1-5 start) we were backs against the wall at this point and it was very stressful.”
Christensen finally got her American team on the board in the fourth, after Einarson made a clutch double punch-out that left Canada sitting three in the rings. The onslaught continued with three more points for Canada in the fifth and Einarson went into the break leading 7-1.
After giving up a 5-0 lead to Sweden on Wednesday and hanging on to win 10-8, Birchard said the scare they got in that game served as a reminder never to let up on any opponent.
“We came out firing, I mean, Kerri making that beautiful shot in the first end to force them to a really tough one was awesome,” said Birchard. “Getting that steal was great after not getting the hammer and we just kept the pedal to the metal and kept putting pressure on them. We learned a lot from the last game in terms of keeping our lead and really just dialing in and staying focused and we executed that today.”
Birchard, made a double peel on her first shot in the fifth and got through a narrow opening to bump a U.S. stone out of scoring position. Sarah Anderson the American third, had a chance for a triple-takeout on her second throw but only got one and that left Canada sitting two. Anderson drew the button with her last shot and Einarson was able to clear it out for a three.
“I think it came down to just straight execution, we just need more shots to beat a team like them, they played great, just definitely not our best game,” said Christensen, who made just 58 per cent of her draws.
“I think it was a little faster than our sheet (on Wednesday) and we just didn’t adjust. Right from the beginning we weren’t executing well enough and Team Canada definitely was playing super well. It gets tricky when you don’t have your draw weight and you have to try and make super-precise freezes.”
Coming out of the break, Team USA swapped lead Taylor Anderson out of the game and replaced her with alternate Sydney Mullaney, but by that point the damage had been done and there wasn’t much hope of a comeback.
“We just figured it wasn’t our best game and we were not likely not going to pull it off so we wanted to get up alternate in… just to get her on the ice,” said Christensen, a native of Duluth, Minn.
Canada will return to CN Centre ice tonight at 7 p.m. to play South Korea. The Koreans (6-2) play Switzerland (9-0) this afternoon at 2.
In the other morning games, Switzerland improved its stake atop the standings with a 7-3 win over Denmark (5-4). Swiss skip Silvana Tirinzoni scored four points in in the fifth to take a commanding lead.
Norway (5-4) moved above the .500 mark with a 7-1 victory over Czech Republic (2-7). The Czechs took the place of Russia when the Russians were excluded from the tournament because of their country’s invasion of Ukraine.
Germany also upped its record to 5-4 after an 8-1 decision over winless Turkey (0-9).
In the other 2 p.m. games today, Germany plays Sweden and Japan faces Norway. Italy will improve to 3-7 with its default win in the afternoon draw over Scotland. The Scots were forced to withdraw on Sunday due to positive COVID tests that affected four members of the team.
