CALGARY — After falling in an extra end to Switzerland on Tuesday night, Canada’s Kerri Einarson foursome went into play at the Women’s World Curling Championship on Wednesday with the goal of getting back on track.
They would do exactly that.
Einarson and her rink of third Val Sweeting, second Shannon Birchard and lead Karlee Burgess picked up a pair of wins, defeating Turkiye’s Dilsat Yildiz 9-3 in the morning draw before getting past Scotland 7-5 in the evening draw.
As a result, Einarson now finds herself tied for first place with Switzerland’s Xenia Schwaller, with both teams holding 7-1 records.
Canada’s game against Scotland was a close one from start to finish, especially as Henderson and crew began to find their game in the middle ends.
Scotland found themselves in a touch of trouble at skip stones in the opening frame, and after Henderson rolled a touch too far on an angle hit-and-roll freeze attempt on her final rock, Einarson drew full eight foot to score two and take a quick 2-0 lead.
Henderson caught a bit of luck in the next end, as her attempted tap back to score one hit a rock in front, but rolled and caught a Scotland stone top four foot, promoting that stone just enough for the single point.
Canada’s front end set things up well for another deuce in the third, and Einarson would oblige, drawing back eight foot with her final rock to extend her lead to 4-1.
A couple of slight misses by Sweeting and Einarson, combined with a great come around by Henderson, led to Scotland having an open hit for a pair in the fourth that they’d make to get back within one.
The fifth end saw an incredible turn of events where Sweeting twice missed a double takeout, going through the port between the two stones on both shots. That left Scotland laying four at Einarson’s first shot, she’d get rid of a pair, and after Henderson came in heavy on her final draw, Einarson would get a takeout to score one and save the end.
It was another tough mistake in the sixth that gave Scotland a chance to score a pair, as Einarson wrecked on a guard in her final shot and left Henderson with a draw for two. She’d come in full four foot, and all of a sudden the game was tied 5-5.
Canada blanked the seventh but were left with a draw to the eighth foot for one with their final shot their next end, and Einarson would go into the final two frames with a one-point lead.
Henderson went with an aggressive draw to grab a piece of the button for two with her final shot in the ninth but came up heavy, tapping her own counter back and giving up the steal for a 7-5 lead coming home.
The final frame looked a little contentious to start, but Canada kept up the pressure and Einarson simply needed to make Henderson’s first rock go away while sitting four herself. She’d make no mistake, Scotland ran out of rocks and the win was in the books.
Einarson was looking to get back in the win column in the morning draw against Turkiye, and her rink would make few mistakes in doing so.
It was close early, though, as Canada scored three in the opening end before Turkiye picked up a pair in the second and stole another in the third to tie things 3-3. Einarson went on run from there, scoring two in the fourth, stealing two more in the fifth and bringing the game to an early end with another pair in the sixth for a 9-3 victory.
Other results from the morning draw saw Denmark’s Madeleine Dupont take a 9-3 win over Norway’s Torild Bjoernstad, Japan’s Satsuki Fujisawa defeat Italy’s Stefania Constantini 8-6 and Sweden’s Isabella Wranaa roll to a 9-4 victory against China’s Rui Wang.
The afternoon draw saw Italy get past the United States’ Delaney Strouse 6-3, Denmark hold off Turkiye 7-6, Korea’s Eunji Gim roll to an 8-3 win over Scotland and Switzerland’s Xenia Schwaller take a dominant 10-1 win over Australia’s Helen Williams.
The remainder of the evening draw games had the unique outcome of all ending 8-2 in six ends, with Japan defeating Sweden, China getting past Australia and Norway using a five-ender to down the United States.
Standings after 14 draws are as follows:
Canada (Einarson) 7-1
Switzerland (Schwaller) 7-1
Japan (Fujisawa) 6-2
Korea (Gim) 6-2
Sweden (Wranaa) 6-3
Turkiye (Yildiz) 5-3
China (Wang) 4-4
Denmark (Dupont) 3-5
Italy (Constantini) 3-5
Scotland (Henderson) 3-6
Norway (Bjoernstad) 2-6
Australia (Williams) 1-8
United States (Strouse) 1-8
Canada plays twice on Thursday, first taking on Korea at 9 a.m. and then facing Norway at 7 p.m.
You can catch all of Canada’s game’s on TSN, and find all the scores and stats at livescores.worldcurling.org.
