Einarson OK, Jones needs wins

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 25/02/2021 (1154 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s impossible to know if Kerri Einarson and Jennifer Jones are being truthful when they claim they don’t scoreboard watch or analyze the standings.

The elite Manitoba curlers say their focus is solely shepherding their teams through the Scotties national women’s championship in Calgary, and prefer (you guessed it) to take things one game at a time.

Best to accept Einarson, the skip of Team Canada — the defending champion and top seed — at her word.

“To be honest, we don’t really focus too much on that. We just know we don’t want to lose any more games, so we just want to focus on our games and what we’re doing,” the pride of Gimli said Friday, after toppling Saskatchewan’s Sherry Anderson 10-6 on the opening draw of the eight-team championship round.

Einarson improved to 9-1 and is guaranteed at least a tiebreaker after registering a convincing 9-3 win over Tracy Fleury of East St. Paul (Wild Card 1) in the evening draw.

The Fleury team, skipped by Chelsea Carey, is 5-5 and out of the playoff picture.

Here’s the state of the union for all the armchair skips out there keeping track as the intensity sizzles at the 2021 Canadian championship, which is using a bubble format at Markin MacPhail Centre.

Rachel Homan of Ontario kept pace with Einarson at 9-1 after eight days on the frozen pebble.

The former three-time Scotties winner and 2017 world champion edged Fleury 7-6 with a steal of one in the 10th end on the afternoon draw. Hours later, a very pregnant Homan showed incredible moxy against Quebec’s Laurie St-Georges, tossing a 10th-end “Hail, Mary” triple-raise to juggle rocks in the four-foot and come away with a game-tying deuce before stealing the winning point in the extra end.

Jones, meanwhile, split a pair of game Friday to fall to 7-3 with two draws to go Saturday.

“I don’t even know exactly what the standings are looking like,” the former Winnipegger, now living near Barrie, Ont., said following the afternoon draw. Jones’ crew representing Manitoba posted a 12-8 victory over Winnipeg’s Beth Peterson, the event’s third wild-card entry.

“We’re just trying to win every game that we play. I think, with only three teams advancing, you can’t have very many losses. We know that and we’re just gonna have to play every game as though we have to get that ‘W’,” said Jones.

The pressure is really on Jones now to win out, following a 7-5 loss to Alberta’s Laura Walker in the evening. Walker is also 7-3 records.

“We were more worried about our own outcome. We also have three losses and we knew we were in big trouble if we came out 1-1 today. Obviously, having them with a lower record helps us in the long run but, really, we just wanted to win that game,” said Alberta third, Kate Cameron, a Winnipegger.

Peterson rebounded with a gritty 10-9 extra-end triumph over Saskatchewan in the evening. Veteran skip Sherry Anderson, a world senior women’s champion, took a night off and Amber Holland filled in.

The Peterson, Anderson and St-Georges crews are each at 6-4 and have faint hopes for a tie-breaker scenario.

A notable change to this year’s format is the abolition of the four-team Page playoff. Instead, just the top three teams after the championship round qualify for the playoffs, with the team with the best record propelled to the Scotties final, set for Sunday evening. The second- and third-place finishers collide in the morning semifinal.

Today at 1:30 p.m., the matchups are: Jones vs. Homan; Peterson vs. Fleury; St-Georges vs. Einarson; Anderson vs. Walker.

Squander a game now and teams do so, quite possibly, at their peril.

“Coming into the event, with the format, you kind of know (what’s at stake), so you’re mentally prepared for it,” said Jocelyn Peterman, second for Team Manitoba. “All of these games in the championship round are going to be really close games and we’re rested and ready for it.”

“For the most part, we’re just focused on what we need to do. This was all about winning this championship but we also just want to try to improve and get better. So, we’re going to try to take everything we can get and see where we’re at and see what we need to work on for the next few months.”

 

 

jason.bell@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @WFPJasonBell