Scotties notebook: Englot stays sharp to reach 1st final
ST. CATHARINES, Ont. — Veteran skip Michelle Englot is veering into uncharted territory at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts.
Englot’s Manitoba team outduelled sharpshooter Rachel Homan of Ontario 9-8 in Friday night’s intense Page 1 vs. 2 playoff to advance straight through to Sunday’s final.
The Regina native Englot skipped her home province of Saskatchewan seven times in the Canadian women’s curling national championship, but never made it past the semifinal with a pair of bronze medals in 1988 and 1989. Englot joined the Winnipeg-based trio of Kate Cameron, Leslie Wilson and Raunora Westcott this season and here they are now in only year one heading to their first gold medal game.
“The girls have played so well all week and to come out and have such a solid game tonight feels really good,” Englot said. “We’ll just keep doing what we’re doing and hopefully come out as strong on Sunday night.”
Whatever Englot has been doing, it’s worked so far against Homan. It was the second consecutive night Englot solved Homan after the two clashed in their final round-robin game — Manitoba was victorious 9-5 that time — to finish tied atop of the leaderboard with identical 10-1 records.
That win earned Englot hammer advantage for the encore. Homan had to keep up with Englot as they matched deuces in the first couple ends, but she couldn’t maintain the pace in the fourth. Down 4-2 and facing three counters, Homan fired a bullet with her last stone, but was just off the mark, grazing the group to move two of them and leaving one remaining for shot and a steal.
An open draw into the eight-foot circle by Homan for two in the fifth closed the gap to one until Englot pulled away again with a three-spot in the sixth. Homan looked at a pair and tried to make a light tap to possibly limit the damage to just one, however, her shot was light and tight coming up short. Englot executed a delicate draw around and into the four-foot circle for the trey and an 8-4 advantage.
Homan kept her rocks separated in the seventh to split the rings and score another deuce.
“We got behind early and that’s a tough team to come back against,” Ontario lead Lisa Weagle said. “We just tried to keep getting our two when we had hammer and tried to keep it close.”
Then came the firing gallery in eight with Homan’s beauty in-off double takeout that also pushed a third out of the way and sent the home-province crowd into a frenzy. Englot responded with a great shot of her own by running another of her rocks in and squeezing through for a single.
Homan looked at another crazy shot in nine eyeing a wide angle raise on her guard to double tap for two. Even though Homan hit it too thin, luck was on her side as the raised stone spiralled into the house and third Emma Miskew and second Joanne Courtney brushed it to the four-foot circle to grab shot stone to trail 9-7 coming home without hammer.
“We’re just playing our game and forcing,” Englot said. “Rachel made a few big shots against us in that game but if we kept putting the pressure on she’s eventually going to miss and we got a couple of misses, so we took advantage of it and we’ve been taking advantage of every opportunity.”
Englot faced two on her last in the 10th and just needed one of them to disappear. She hit and rolled out on the open shot rock to secure a spot in the final and is now one win away from representing Canada next month at the world championship in Beijing, China.
“It would be incredible,” Englot said. “I have put a lot of time into it. I have such a solid team and just hoping to stay the course and stay focused and relaxed and come out and do what we do.”
Homan heads to semifinal
Team Ontario’s Lisa Weagle, Rachel Homan and Joanne Courtney need a moment to think during the Page 1 vs. 2 playoff at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts in St. Catharines, Ont. (Anil Mungal)
It’s not the ideal route, but Team Homan has another lifeline to the championship game through Saturday evening’s semifinal.
The team plays the waiting game for now with their opponent to be determined in the afternoon Page 3 vs. 4 playoff between Team Canada’s Chelsea Carey and Northern Ontario’s Krista McCarville.
The changing ice conditions have been a major factor throughout the week and Weagle sees it as a positive to get another chance to feeling things out.
“The ice was a little bit different today and it was good to kind of learn that and throw lots of draws and see how rocks are running,” she said. “I think that having another opportunity to play on that ice isn’t a bad thing for us.”
Homan won back-to-back Scotties titles in 2013 and 2014 with Miskew, Weagle and second Alison Kreviazuk. Courtney, of Edmonton, linked up with the Ottawa-based squad ahead of the 2014-15 season when Kreviazuk moved to Sweden. Alison’s sister Cheryl Kreviazuk is Team Homan’s alternate for the week.
Team Homan will start with hammer for the semifinal aiming to continue the quest for a third Canadian championship.
“Rachel’s been making some great shots all week,” Weagle said. “We’re just trying to support her as much as we can and hope to have a really good semi tomorrow.”
McCarville makes Final Four
McCarville (8-3) claimed the fourth and final spot in the Page playoffs defeating Kerry Galusha of the Northwest Territories 10-6 during the morning draw to qualify.
Quebec’s Eve Belisle wrapped up her round-robin schedule Thursday night at 7-4 and needed a McCarville loss to force a tiebreaker match.
However, the Thunder Bay, Ont., team came out as strong as ever throwing eight perfect stones in the opening end to score an early three-count.
“We’re starting strong, which is really nice, and the last couple games we’ve been really sharp right off the bat so just trying to take advantage of that,” Northern Ontario lead Sarah Potts said. “It’s nice to start out with a lead but then again it’s like, oh we have so many ends to try to defend the lead, so it’s tough.”
“It’s a long 10 ends to try and keep a lead,” she added. “We know they want to go out on a win too so they’re still in it and trying to win so we just had to stay sharp.”
An additional three-spot cushion in the sixth gave McCarville a commanding 9-3 advantage, however, Galusha remained resilient and chipped away at the deficit with a deuce in seven followed by a steal in eight. McCarville tacked on another point in the ninth to ice the game.
Avoiding the tiebreaker was key as Potts said it’s nice to have a break before heading back out for the playoffs against Carey (9-2).
“We had kind of three back-to-back and a late night last night,” she said. “It’ll be nice to get some rest, and just even physically and everything, to have some time off and get ready for tomorrow’s game.”
While the 3 vs. 4 game is a rematch of last year’s final, McCarville was victorious 8-4 over Carey during their round-robin match Thursday afternoon and gives the team some confidence.
“We know we can beat them,” Potts said. “Obviously they’re a really good team, they’ve beaten us before, so we’re going to have to play our best and they’ll have to play well too. It should be a good game.”
Last year was a comeback season for McCarville following a break from competitive curling and Northern Ontario flew under the radar en route to the silver medal. They didn’t have the luxury of being underestimated by opponents this time around.
“It’s a little bit different vibe,” Potts said. “Last year we were definitely a little bit more of the underdogs. I still think of us as a bit of the underdogs as well this year but we have more confidence and higher expectations of ourselves so it’s a different feeling.”
Honours & awards
It was a near sweep for Ontario for first team all-stars.
Skip Rachel Homan, third Emma Miskew and second Joanne Courtney took the top honours Friday based on shooting percentages following the conclusion of round-robin play.
Homan and Miskew both fired at an 84 percent clip with Courtney shooting 85. Lead Lisa Weagle actually had a team-high 86, although it was only good enough for second team all-star selection at her position.
Blaine de Jager of B.C. also shot 86 percent and edged out Weagle for the first-team spot at lead based on tiebreakers.
Joining Weagle on the second team are Carey (83 percent), B.C. third Shannon Aleksic (82 percent) and Alberta second Sarah Wilkes (84 percent).
Two awards were also handed out Friday with Northwest Territories skip Kerry Galusha receiving the Marj Mitchell Sportsmanship Award and curling coach Wendy Morgan earning the Joan Mead Builder Award.