Trio of Canadian teams aim for world championship podiums in Oestersund

Canada’s pursuit for international curling medals will continue later this month as the 2024 World Mixed Doubles Championship and 2024 World Senior Women’s and Men’s Curling Championships get underway Saturday in Oestersund, Sweden.

In the mixed doubles competition, it will be the newly crowned Canadian championship tandem of Kadriana Lott and Colton Lott  wearing the Maple Leaf and attempting to win Canada’s first gold medal at the world mixed doubles championship.

At the World Seniors, teams skipped by Susan Froud (Alliston, Ont.) and Paul Flemming (Halifax) will try to defend the gold medals won last year in Gangneung, South Korea, by Canada’s Team Sherry Anderson (Saskatoon) and Team Howard Rajala (Ottawa).

Both world events are being played at the Oestersund Arena — the same venue that played host to these events in 2018, when Canada’s Laura Walker and Kirk Muyres won a bronze medal, and the Canadian senior teams, skipped by Anderson and Wade White swept to the women’s and men’s gold medals.

Here’s a look at the 2024 events:

World Mixed Doubles Championship

After falling short in two previous Canadian finals (including in 2018 when they lost to Walker and Muyres), Kadriana and Colton Lott finally broke through last month in Fredericton to earn their first trip to the world championship.

But it won’t be the first time the Lotts have worn the Maple Leaf in Sweden. In 2019, they were named to represent Canada at the Curling World Cup event in Jonkoping, Sweden, where they would win gold, beating Norway’s Kristin Skaslien (who’ll be playing in Oestersund with current partner Magnus Nedregotten) and Thomas Ulsrud in the final.

Coaches Viktor Kjell and Scott Pfeifer round out the Canadian contingent.

The 20-team field will be split into two 10-team groups, with Canada grouped with Australia, China, Czechia, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Scotland, South Korea, Sweden and the United States.

Each group will play a nine-game round robin, and the top three teams from each group will advance to the playoffs. The first-place teams in each group receive a bye to the semifinals. The second- and third-place teams cross over for qualification games from which the winners advance to the semifinals. The winners of those games go to the gold-medal game, and the losing teams compete in the bronze-medal game. 

Canada has never won the World Mixed Doubles Championship, but has finished on the podium four times (two silver, two bronze) since the event’s inception in 2008.

Last year at Gangneung, Canada’s Jennifer Jones and Brent Laing posted an 8-1 round-robin record to finish first in their pool, but lost to the United States in the semifinal and then to Norway in the bronze-medal game.

Here’s is Canada’s complete mixed doubles schedule (all times ET):

• Saturday, 8 a.m. — Canada vs. New Zealand (Courtney Smith/Anton Hood)
• Sunday, 4 a.m. — Canada vs. Czechia (Zuzana Paulova/Tomas Paul)
• Sunday, noon — Canada vs. the Netherlands (Vanessa Tonoli/Wouter Goesgens)
• Monday, 8 a.m. — Canada vs. South Korea (Jiyoon Kim/Byeongjin Jeong)
• Tuesday, 4 a.m. — Canada vs. Scotland (Sophie Jackson/Duncan McFadzean)
• Tuesday, noon — Canada vs. Sweden (Isabella Wrana/Rasmus Wrana)
• Wednesday, 8 a.m. — Canada vs. China (Ying Yang/Jiafeng Tian)
• Thursday, 4 a.m. — Canada vs. Australia (Tahli Gill/Dean Hewitt)
• Thursday, noon — Canada vs. United States (Becca Hamilton/Matt Hamilton)
• (If Canada qualifies):
• Friday, 4 a.m. — Playoff qualification games
• Friday, noon — Semifinals
• Saturday, 4 a.m. — Bronze-medal game
• Saturday, 8 a.m. — Gold-medal game

The World Curling’s live-streaming platform The Curling Channel will be the only way to watch games from the World Mixed Doubles Championship.

For the latest scores, draw and list of teams, CLICK HERE.

World Senior Women’s and Men’s Championships

Two teams will be making their world championship debuts for Canada, looking to add to a rich legacy of past Canadian successes at the World Senior Championships.

Since the introduction of the World Seniors in 2002, Canadian teams have won 14 women’s gold medals and 13 men’s gold medals. The next highest total in each gender is three — Scotland in women’s play and the United States in men’s play.

Both of the 2024 Canadian teams qualified by winning gold at the 2023 Everest Canadian Senior Championships earlier this season in Vernon, B.C.

Froud’s team — vice-skip Kerry Lackie, second Kristin Turcotte, lead Julie McMullin, alternate Jo-Ann Rizzo and coach Al Corbeil round out the squad — will be looking to follow in the footsteps of Anderson’s Saskatoon team, which was recently inducted into the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame having won five straight Canadian senior titles and three of the past four World Senior championships.

Eighteen women’s teams are headed to Sweden, split into three groups of six. After the five-game round robins are complete, the top two teams from each group will advance to the quarterfinals, along with the two third-place teams with the best Last-Shot Draw totals.

Canada is in a group with Czechia, Finland, Japan, Lithuania and Norway.

Here is the schedule for the Canadian women (all times ET):

• Saturday, 6 a.m. — Canada vs. Finland (Team Tiina Julkunen)
• Sunday, 2 a.m. — Canada vs. Lithuania (Team Virginija Paulauskaite)
• Monday, 2 p.m. — Canada vs. Japan (Team Miyako Yoshimura)
• Tuesday, 6 a.m. — Canada vs. Czechia (Team Jana Berankova)
• Wednesday, 10 a.m. — Canada vs. Norway (Team Ellen Storvik)
• (If Canada qualifies):
• Thursday, 1 p.m. — Quarterfinals
• Friday, 1 p.m. — Semifinals
• Saturday, 4:30 a.m. — Gold-medal, bronze-medal games

On the men’s side,  Flemming’s Halifax team (with vice-skip Peter Burgess, second Martin Gavin, lead Kris Granchelli and alternate Kevin Ouellette) will be looking to stretch Canada’s World Senior Men’s gold-medal streak to five, going back to Team White’s victory in 2018 at Oestersund. Team White won again in 2022 at Geneva, Switzerland, with Team Bryan Cochrane prevailing in 2019 at Stavanger, Norway, and Team Rajala last year (the 2020 and 2021 events fell victim to the pandemic).

There will be 25 men’s teams competing in Oestersund, split into four pools — one with seven teams and three with six. Following the round robins in each group, the top two teams in each group will qualify for the quarterfinals.

Canada is in Group A with Croatia, Denmark, Finland,, Norway, the Philippines and Wales.

Here is the schedule for the Canadian men (all times ET):

• Saturday, 10 a.m. — Canada vs. Norway (Team Flemming Davanger)
• Sunday, 6 a.m. — Canada vs. Wales (Team Andrew Tanner)
• Monday, 6 a.m. — Canada vs. Finland (Team Mika Kalpamaa)
• Tuesday, 10 a.m. — Canada vs. the Philippines (Team Jonathan Ochoco)
• Wednesday, 2 a.m. — Canada vs. Croatia (Team Alberto Skendrovic)
• Thursday, 7 a.m. — Canada vs. Denmark (Team Mikael Qvist)
• (If Canada qualifies):
• Thursday, 1 p.m. — Quarterfinals
• Friday, 1 p.m. — Semifinals
• Saturday, 4:30 a.m. — Gold-medal, bronze-medal games

Canada’s men’s team has played in the gold-medal game in all 19 previous editions of the World Senior Championships, winning 13 of those finals.

There is no streaming coverage planned for the World Senior Championships. For the latest scores, draw and list of teams, CLICK HERE.