News Tour Challenge

PARADISE, N.L. — There hasn’t been any trouble in paradise for Ottawa’s Rachel Homan at the inaugural Tour Challenge.

Homan, third Emma Miskew, second Joanne Courtney, and lead Lisa Weagle have been lights out all week and capped the round-robin with a 6-2 victory over Edmonton’s Team Val Sweeting to top the women’s division with an undefeated 4-0 record. 

Team Homan now head to the quarterfinals (Saturday, 5:30 p.m. NT) as the No. 1 seed in the season-opening Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling event at the Paradise Double Ice Complex.

“It was really good,” Miskew said. “We came out here and were just focusing on making one shot at a time. Our record doesn’t really matter too much to us, we wanted to make the playoffs. We’re really happy we get to play in the quarters tomorrow.” 

Homan blanked the first, took two in the second and stole one in the third to jump out to a 3-0 lead. Homan made a nifty double takeout in four to clear the house leaving Sweeting with no other option but to throw her final shot through the rings to blank. Sweeting had one of Homan’s stones sandwiched but the two-time Masters champion Homan made yet another incredible shot to knock them both out and sit two, forcing Sweeting to take a single. 

Homan continued to apply pressure with a three-ender in the sixth. Sweeting looked to blank the seventh but her stone caught just enough of the 12-foot ring to count, after a close measurement, and she shook hands.

The reigning Masters champion Sweeting missed the playoffs with a 1-3 record. 

Winnipeg’s Kristy McDonald held on to beat Moscow’s Anna Sidorova 4-3. McDonald (3-1) also moves on to the quarterfinals while Sidorova (0-4) is heading home winless.

EunJung Kim of South Korea is playoff-bound as well with an 8-5 victory over Switzerland’s Alina Paetz (1-3). The reigning world champion Paetz was missing third Nadine Lehmann, who fell ill just before the game, and her team played as a trio.

McDonald and Kim meet in the quarterfinals. Edmonton’s Kelsey Rocque (3-1) is set to face Silvana Tirinzoni of Switzerland (2-2). Homan and Sherry Middaugh (3-1) of Coldwater, Ont., await the winners of the tiebreakers.

Tracy Fleury of Sudbury, Ont., takes on Calgary’s Chelsea Carey and Winnipeg’s Jennifer Jones faces Scotland’s Eve Muirhead in tiebreakers (Saturday, 7:30 a.m. NT; free admission).

NOTES: The Tour Challenge is the first of two new tournaments on the expanded seven-event 2015-16 Pinty’s GSOC season and features 30 men’s and 30 women’s teams split into two tiers. … Winners of the Tier 1 divisions also receive berths to the second new Pinty’s GSOC event, the season-ending Champions Cup. … Tier 2 champions earn byes to the next Grand Slam, the Masters, running Oct. 27 to Nov. 1 in Truro, N.S.