CANADA EYES GOLD!

Homan leads Team Canada to gold-medal final at BKT Tires World Women’s Curling

When in doubt, put your trust in skip Rachel Homan.

Homan made a series of big-time shots in the second half of the game, launching Team Canada into the gold-medal final Sunday at the BKT Tires World Women’s Curling Championship.

The Canadians will be going into the final with a chip on their shoulders. It’s been six years since a Canadian team has claimed global honours, but skip Homan and her teammates from the Ottawa Curling club have earned the right to fight for it again after defeating skip Eunji Gim’s Team South Korea 9-7 in a white-knuckle semifinal game at Centre 200 in Sydney, N.S.

The Canadians will square off against defending champions skip Silvana Tirinzoni’s Team Switzerland in the final. The Swiss dispatched Team Italy, skipped by Stefania Constantini, 6-3 in the other semifinal.

It was a hugely satisfying win for Homan on two levels. One, she is one step closer to gold, and, two, it avenged her only loss of the week that came Friday at the hands of the Koreans.

“We’ve fought so hard all season, we’ve trained, we’ve prepared for this moment,” said an overjoyed Homan, who is backed by vice-skip Tracy Fleury, second Emma Miskew, lead Sarah Wilkes, alternate Rachel Brown and coached by Don Bartlett and national coach Viktor Kjell. “We know that we’re ready and we’re going to give it everything we can. To win gold for Canada would just mean everything.”

Jennifer Jones skipped the last Canadian team to win gold in 2018 in North Bay, Ont.

It’s been even a longer wait for Homan to grab gold. She won the title in 2017 in Beijing and has been chasing it ever since.

To be the best you have to beat the best, and the Canadians will certainly have to do that. Tirinzoni and last-rock throwing vice Alina Paetz are shooting for their fifth-straight world title. The front end of second Selina Witschonke and Carole Howald have been recent additions.

The Canadians do have a leg up on the Swiss heading into the game. Canada defeated Switzerland 8-5 in the round robin, ending the Swiss team’s 42-game winning streak in world competition, and have won four games this season against them.

Miskew said the Canadians fed off the Sydney crowd and will do so again Sunday.

“Playing as Team Canada in Canada, this crowd is just so much energy . . . we’re feeling the love and we’re feeling the energy,” she said. “That would be amazing (to win in Canada). It’s going to be a battle tomorrow against a team we know very well.” 

The Canadians had their hands full with the Koreans, the No. 3-ranked team in the world, especially in the first half of the game. Much like the game the night before, the Koreans defused anything the Canadians had going early with well-timed hit-and-rolls, runbacks and freezes.

Homan, who had been such a machine all week, was just a bit off on a couple of shots early that could have made a difference.

But she regained her form in the second half of the game. She made back-to-back pressure draws in the seventh end to limit the Koreans to a single, and made another cold draw behind a single front stone to set up a Canadian deuce in the eighth to go up 6-5.

Team South Korea jumped back into the lead with a deuce in the ninth, but Homan wasn’t finished. She made a crucial double-takeout with her first rock and, after Gim’s attempt to hide behind cover peeked open, Homan punched it out to clinch the win.

Homan gave her team a lot of credit.

“My team played amazing in front of me,” she said. “Korea played amazing, they made every roll, we had to fight for every point we got. Thankfully we were able to force them back and get away with a three in the final end.”

The final goes Sunday at 5 p.m. (all times Atlantic), while Italy will play South Korea for the bronze at 11 a.m.

Live scoring, standings and statistics for the 2024 BKT Tires World Women’s Curling Championship are available by CLICKING HERE.

TSN and RDS2 will provide complete coverage of the 2024 BKT Tires World Women’s Curling Championship. CLICK HERE for the complete schedule.

For ticket information for the 2024 BKT Tires World Women’s Curling Championship, go to www.curling.ca/2024worldwomen/tickets/.

This story will be available in French as soon as possible at www.curling.ca/2024worldwomen/nouvelles/?lang=fr