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Meet the Teams: Manitoba – Lawes, Ontario – Inglis, British Columbia – Grandy, P.E.I.
MEET THE TEAMS COMPETING AT THE 2024 SCOTTIES TOURNAMENT OF HEARTS
The 2024 Scotties Tournament of Hearts is slated for Feb. 15-24 at the WinSport Event Centre in Calgary. Eighteen women’s teams will compete in the national curling championship.
Tickets for the 2024 Scotties Tournament of Hearts can be purchased at https://www.curling.ca/2024scotties/tickets/
Meet the teams:
Team Manitoba
An up-and-down season is back on the upswing for Team Kaitlyn Lawes.
After struggling to a 1-3 record at the Co-op Canadian Open in mid-January that ran its record to 26-21 prior to provincial playdowns, the Winnipeg-based rink bounced back with vengeance at provincials, claiming a tight 9-8 win over Team Beth Peterson in the Manitoba final.
Deuces in the first, third, fifth and ninth ends led to the victory for Lawes, vice-skip Selena Njegovan, second Jocelyn Peterman and lead Kristin MacCuish. The team is coached by Connor Njegovan.
Lawes – the long-time vice-skip for Jennifer Jones – leads her foursome into their second-straight appearance at the Scotties, the first came as a Wild Card as the team finished 5-3 at the 2023 Scotties before losing out in a tiebreaker.
The team – which is now 34-22 overall in 2023-24 – brings with it plenty of experience in the form of what will be 10 Scotties appearances for Lawes, including a title in 2015 with Jones at skip; two silvers; and three bronze medals at the national championship.
Lawes also has two Olympic gold medals to her name, one with Team Jones in 2014 and the other in mixed doubles with John Morris in 2018. Lawes also has a gold medal from the 2018 World Championship as she returned from the Olympics to rejoin Jones. Lawes is also a silver and bronze medallist from the World Juniors in 2009 and 2008, respectively.
At the 2023 Scotties, a pregnant Njegovan was replaced by Laura Walker. Njegovan will compete in her eighth Scotties, although last season she was on the bench on parental leave. Her best finishes nationally were silver medals at both the 2018 Scotties with skip Kerri Einarson and the 2021 Canadian Curling Trials with skip Tracy Fleury.
MacCuish was a teammate of Njegovan’s on both those runner-up teams and this will be her eighth trip to the Scotties, where she won silver as an alternate with Jennifer Jones in 2013.
This will be Scotties No. 8 for Peterman, having won the event playing out of Alberta in 2016 with Chelsea Carey and she has two bronze medals from nationals in 2017 (again with Carey, only as Team Canada) and 2019 (with Jennifer Jones and Lawes as Team Wild Card). In 2017 Peterman was also a runner-up with Team Carey at the Canadian Curling Trials.
Peterman is a two-time Canadian mixed doubles champion (2016 and 2019) with her fiancé Brett Gallant, winning silver at Worlds in 2019. She also claimed gold at the 2021 Canadian Curling Trials with Jones and Lawes, advancing to the 2022 Winter Olympics, where they did not qualify for medals.
Team Ontario
Danielle Inglis is finally over the hump and over the moon as the skip, along with teammates Kira Brunton at vice-skip, second Calissa Daly, lead Cassandra de Groot and alternate Kimberly Tuck, earned the right to represent Ontario at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts.
Inglis’s Ottawa Hunt and Golf Club rink avenged a loss to Team Carly Howard in the Page 1-2 playoff game with an 8-7 victory in the championship final. Three multiple scores, including a four-ender in the sixth added to deuces in the second and eighth ends, capped the win.
Inglis iced the game with a draw against two Howard stones, outcounting one to clinch the title.
“Pinch us. Dreams do come true. Team Ontario!!!” the team posted on X.
The team finished 5-1 on the week, the only loss coming in the 8-3 setback to Howard. This will be Inglis’s third appearance at the Scotties with her first two as alternates for Team Hollie Duncan in 2018 and Team Rachel Homan in 2021, the latter earning a silver medal.
As a junior, Inglis defeated Homan in 2008 to win the Ontario title. Inglis was also the vice-skip on Mike Anderson’s 2018 World Mixed Curling Championship team that earned gold.
Brunton was the alternate for Krysta Burns’ Northern Ontario team at the 2021 Scotties and Homan’s 2023 Scotties team. She also claimed a gold medal as vice-skip for Megan Smith at the 2015 Canada Winter Games; topped the field as skip at the 2017 Canadian U-18 Curling Championship; and won the 2019 U SPORTS crown representing Laurentian University.
Daly competed in the 2019 New Holland Canadian U-21 Championships for Ontario and won gold with Northern Ontario’s Jacob Horgan in the mixed doubles portion of the competition and represented Queen’s University in curling.
De Groot has teamed up with Inglis for the last 10 seasons and they did compete at the 2021 Canadian Pre-Trials and de Groot was a runner-up at the 2018 Ontario Scotties.
Tuck is well known in the Ontario curling circles having won the 2014 Canadian Mixed Doubles Championship with husband Wayne Tuck Jr. and played third with Wayne at five Canadian Mixed Curling Championships. She competed as the alternate for Allison Flaxey at the 2014 Scotties and played second for Jo-Ann Rizzo at the 2005 Canada Cup and 2005 Canadian Pre-Trials.
Team British Columbia – Grandy
Team Clancy Grandy struck early and often to earn its second straight BC provincial women’s curling championship, scoring five in the second end on the way to an 11-3 victory over Team Corryn Brown in just seven ends.
Grandy and her Vancouver Curling Club team of vice-skip Kayla MacMillan, second Lindsay Dubue and lead Sarah Loken added steals of two and one in the third and fourth ends, before surrendering a single to Brown in the fifth and adding three more in the sixth in leading to the win.
This will be Ontario-born Grandy’s third trip to nationals as she played alternate for the Tracy Fleury team, which was skipped by Chelsea Carey, at the 2021 Scotties, as Fleury remained home during the COVID-19 pandemic. Grandy had also claimed an Ontario junior title with teammates Sarah Wilkes, Laura Walker and Lynn Kreviazuk, back in 2011. She also represented the Wilfrid Laurier University team with Walker.
Grandy also curled with the likes of Allison Flaxey before taking her talents to B.C., taking over MacMillan’s 2022 B.C. Scotties runners-up team that included Dubue and Loken, which lost the final 8-6 to veteran curler Mary-Anne Arsenault, who had also moved west.
Team Grandy was a perfect 9-0 at the 2024 provincials, averaging 12.43 points per game for and just 4.71 against.
MacMillan, Dube and Loken will all make their second-straight trips to the Scotties with Grandy,
MacMillan won a provincial junior title with skip Sarah Daniels and Loken in 2019 and finished as runners-up to Alberta’s Selena Sturmay at the New Holland Canadian U-21 championship. Dubue is also originally from Ontario, having played in three New Holland Canadian U-21 Championships.
Team Prince Edward Island
In one of the wildest 2024 provincial women’s curling championships, Team Jane DiCarlo used her last-rock advantage to claim an 9-8 extra-end win over Team Amanda Power to earn the Prince Edward Island crown.
DiCarlo, who throws third stones, is joined by last-rock thrower Veronica Mayne, second Sabrina Smith and lead Whitney Jenkins, claimed the title at the Silver Fox Entertainment Complex in Summerside. After finishing 3-2 in the round-robin, DiCarlo then defeated Power two more times to earn the title in the modified triple-knockout event.
Facing three opposing stones, Mayne was forced to make an angle raise for the win. Down 4-2 after three ends, Team DiCarlo recorded four-straight singles before allowing a three-ender in the eighth. The team came back with a deuce in the ninth before forcing a single in the 10th to take the game to the extra end.
DiCarlo, who is the president of Curl PEI, had represented the University of Prince Edward Island at three U SPORTS Curling Championships. She is also the 2014 Canadian Club Championship silver-medallist.
It’s the first trip to the Scotties for the entire team. Smith also previously competed for UPEI and was Mayne’s vice-skip on a team that finished second at the 2020 Scotties. Jenkins played lead on that rink.
Mayne and Smith are sisters and represented Prince Edward Island at the 2022 Everest Canadian Curling Club Championships at West Edmonton Mall.
Jenkins competed at two New Holland U-21 Canadian Curling Championships for Prince Edward Island in 2010 and 2011.
The team will be joined by alternate Emily Best and coach Daryell Nowlan.
Tickets for the 2024 Scotties Tournament of Hearts can be purchased at https://www.curling.ca/2024scotties/tickets/