OSHAWA, Ont. — Rachel Homan ran the table at the National to continue her impressive run through the Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling this season.
Homan scored two in the final end to lift her Ottawa-based rink to a 5-4 over Tracy Fleury, of Sudbury, to capture the inaugural women’s National title Sunday at the General Motors Centre.
The team of Homan, third Emma Miskew, second Joanne Courtney, and lead Lisa Weagle finished 7-0 in the major event and have improved their record to 20-1 overall in the series.
“It’s a great feeling,” Miskew said. “We didn’t really think about the fact that it was the first one, just going out there and shooting one shot at a time but that’s really cool. We’re really excited that we were a part of it this year so I’m really happy.”
It was Homan’s third Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling final through three events this season after finishing runner-up at the Tour Challenge Tier 1 event in September and taking home her third career Masters title in four seasons just two weeks ago. Fleury played in her first career Grand Slam final.
Homan blanked the first but was forced to a single in the second. Fleury then blanked the third and drew for one in the fourth. Fleury missed the double takeout, only getting one, and Homan punched out the counter for a deuce.
Fleury made a hit and stick to match and count two in the sixth.
Things got a little hectic in the seventh when Team Homan believed they had second shot while Team Fleury, who held shot stone, wanted a measurement for second. Homan opted for the draw but came up light to give up the steal, but Courtney kicked off their rock before Fleury could measure and could have taken two. However, they chose to only swipe one point to take a 4-3 lead with Homan holding the hammer coming home.
“Rachel made a freeze on her first shot to be second shot but I guess it wasn’t completely obvious to both teams that who was shot in that situation. They looked a couple times but I looked to make sure before Rachel threw her last shot and I was like, ‘Okay yeah, we’re second so throw the draw’ because if we hadn’t been second I was going to suggest we throw the hit and roll just to make sure that we only gave up one if the shot came up light, which it did,” Miskew explained. “Then I didn’t know that they had intended on measuring it so Jo moved the rock off really quick and they were like, ‘Oh we were going to measure that,’ so in that situation if they wanted to measure and we kicked it off too early, it’s actually they could have taken their two.”
“I explained that we would have hit it so they were actually really great to just take the one there,” she added. “It’s tough looking back at that and we made a mistake but it was really amazing that they took the one and let the game go to the eighth.”
Miskew missed her raise attempt on her first shot — missing Fleury’s stone and taking out her own in the back 12-foot circle instead –but nailed it on her second to sit for shot.
“We kind of needed that,” Miskew said. “After my first one, taking out the back one there wasn’t the end of the world there, we really just needed to make contact with their rock but it was unfortunate that I kind of just made a wall so the next one was really important. I really just tried to stick to throwing the rock at the broom. Rachel called the line great.”
Homan took control in skip stones and was able to draw for second shot with her last to count two for the win.
MEN’S FINAL RECAP
Brad Gushue of St. John’s has defeated Winnipeg’s Reid Carruthers 7-2 to win the Pinty’s GSOC National men’s championship on Sunday.
Carruthers blanked the first and had a chance to score four in second but he needed to make a tricky tap back to eliminate Gushue’s stone. Carruthers’ shooter rubbed off of one of his stones and he wasn’t able to get the takeout to give up one. He kept the house clean in the third end for another blank.
Carruthers faced two with his last shot in four but made the open draw to the button to score one. He missed a double attempt and Gushue capitalized drawing to score two in the fifth end and go ahead 3-1. Carruthers was forced to a single in six.
Gushue got through the guards with his last shot in seven and tapped to score one. Carruthers missed his last shot in the eighth end.
Gushue, now a four-time Grand Slam champion, has won five titles on tour this season and finished runner-up in the Tour Challenge Tier 1 event in September.
Team Carruthers, the reigning Manitoba provincial champions, were playing in their first Pinty’s GSOC final together.
Meanwhile, Ottawa’s Rachel Homan faces Tracy Fleury, of Sudbury, in an all-Ontario rink final for the inaugural National women’s title.
This is Homan’s third Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling final through three events this season, finishing runner-up at the Tour Challenge Tier 1 event in September and taking home the Masters title two weeks ago. Fleury will play in her first career Grand Slam final.
National Live: Scores | Playoff Brackets | Draw Schedule | TV Schedule
Men’s Semifinals Recap
OSHAWA, Ont. — Reid Carruthers faced three coming home but punched out Glenn Howard’s shot rock to secure a 5-2 victory and a spot in the men’s final of the National.
Carruthers will take on 2006 Olympic gold medallist Brad Gushue, who earned an 8-6 win over John Epping in Saturday’s semifinals at the General Motors Centre.
Although Carruthers has won this event before, taking the 2013 National title with Team Jeff Stoughton, it’s his first trip to the final at a Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling event as a skip.
“I’m not going to lie, this is the first final I’ve been in as a skip on the Grand Slam series so I’m pretty excited,” Carruthers said.
Since parting ways and forming his own team last season, Carruthers qualified for the playoffs at five Pinty’s GSOC events but couldn’t get past the barrier in the quarterfinals.
His team went up against Team Brad Jacobs, of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., this time in the quarters and they took down the reigning Olympic champions 7-5 earlier Saturday.
“Obviously it was on our minds because since we started curling together, in the Grand Slams we had been to five quarterfinals and not made it past that point,” Carruthers said. “So this morning we’re playing the Olympic champs and you’re thinking to yourself, ‘we’re the underdogs here but hopefully if you play well, you can beat them.’ It worked out today.”
The win set up the semifinal showdown against Howard, a 16-time Grand Slam champion. Carruthers opened with hammer and blanked the first but was forced to a single in two by landing on the lid with a draw shot.
Team Howard, from Penetanguishene, Ont., faced two counters with their last in the third but came up light and gave up a steal of two to trail 3-0. Howard struggled again clipping a guard with his final shot in the fourth but already had shot rock and got on the board with a single.
The rinks alternated singles in six and seven as Howard was unable to mount a comeback.
Carruthers lost his first game of the tournament to Epping but then went on a roll and has won five straight. Gushue also holds a 5-1 record at the National with his lone loss coming against Calgary’s Kevin Koe, who prevailed again in a rematch of the Tour Challenge Tier 1 final during the round-robin portion.
Meanwhile, Gushue earned two in the first and stole one in the second for a 3-0 lead until Epping went ahead with an amazing shot to score four in the third.
Gushue could only get a single in the fourth end to tie it but got lucky breaks in the next two ends stealing one in the fifth and three in the sixth. Epping counted two in seven but ran out of rocks in eight.
“It’s great we’re in a Grand Slam final,” said Team Gushue third Mark Nichols. “The second one this year and hopefully we’ll be on the other side of it tomorrow afternoon but we’re going to have to play a little bit better than we did tonight.”
Gushue is a three-time Grand Slam champion and won the National in 2010. Nichols also earned a second National title, coincidentally, while playing front-end with Carruthers on Team Stoughton before he rejoined Gushue last season.
“We’re going to have to play well,” Nichols said. “They seem to be curling really well and they’re confident. We’ve been playing well this week too so I expect a good back-and-forth game and hopefully we’ll have hammer coming home in the last end.”
Carruthers also shared what it’ll take to win and jokingly trash-talked his former teammate.
“They’re one of the best teams in the world,” Carruthers said adding with a smile, “We’re playing well so it should be a really good game but hopefully I can get him off his game, throw some jabs here and get in his head a little bit but it’ll be tough. He’s a pretty mentally strong guy.”
The National is the third stop — and second major — of the 2015-16 Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling season and runs through to Sunday evening at the General Motors Centre. Previously a men’s invitational, the National expanded this year to include a women’s division for the first time in the event’s history.
Tracy Fleury, of Sudbury, Ont., faces Ottawa’s Rachel Homan for the inaugural women’s National title. Watch at 4 p.m. ET / 1 p.m. PT Sunday on Sportsnet.
Women’s Semifinals Recap
OSHAWA, Ont. — It’s going to be a Battle of Ontario for the inaugural women’s title at the National with Tracy Fleury set to face Rachel Homan in the final.
Fleury, of Sudbury, Ont., punched her ticket to her first career Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling final after capitalizing on some lucky breaks against Edmonton’s Val Sweeting to score a 9-1 victory during Saturday night’s semis.
“We’re super-excited,” Fleury said with a smile. “We’re really looking forward to tomorrow’s game.”
Watch the women’s final live Sunday at 4 p.m. ET / 1 p.m. PT on Sportsnet
Sweeting opened with hammer but struggled early conceding a steal of one in the second and then fell in a deep hole giving up a five-count in the third.
“We put a lot of pressure on them in the third end and they just really had one bad end,” Fleury said. “Then they had to start gambling so it was just that kind of game.”
Sweeting looked to bounce back for two in the fourth but her shooter rolled too far and wasn’t close enough for second. Fleury made an open hit for three in the fifth to bring out the handshakes.
Fleury fell in her opening game to EunJung Kim of South Korea but has now won five straight.
Meanwhile, Homan, from Ottawa, continued her undefeated streak at the National, extending her record to 6-0 with a 5-3 win over Saskatoon’s Stefanie Lawton.
Homan scored a deuce in the fourth end to go ahead and added a steal in five to make it 4-2. Lawton settled for a single in six, Homan blanked the seventh and added another point coming home.
Team Homan holds a 19-1 win-loss record in the Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling series this season and the two-time Scotties champion won her third Masters title in four years just two weeks ago.
The National is the third stop — and second major — of the 2015-16 Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling season. Previously a men’s invitational, the National expanded this year to include a women’s division for the first time in the event’s history.
Watch the men’s final between Brad Gushue of St. John’s and Winnipeg’s Reid Carruthers on Sunday at noon ET / 9 a.m. PT on CBC.
Women’s Quarterfinals Recap
Saskatoon’s Stefanie Lawton defeated reigning Olympic and Scotties champion Jennifer Jones of Winnipeg 6-5 in the women’s quarterfinals of the National Saturday afternoon.
Jones scored a deuce in the second while Lawton has been held to singles in one and three. Lawton wrecked her final shot but Jones wasn’t able to capitalize as she hit and rolled too far and only got a single.
Lawton already had shot rock before throwing her last and made an in-off for second to get two and go up 4-3. Jones also had one in the bank for her last in sixth but threw her final shot too heavy and only got one point.
Lawton had five stones in the house before her last in seven but couldn’t knock out Jones’s lone stone from the house and was only able to count two.
Jones had a chance to get two in the eighth to tie it but rolled heavy.
WATCH THE MEN’S AND WOMEN’S SEMIFINALS LIVE ON SPORTSNET ONE AT 7:30 P.M. ET
Lawton now faces Ottawa’s Rachel Homan, who advanced with a 5-4 victory over Kelsey Rocque of Edmonton.
Homan blanked the first end and was forced to settle for one in the second, however, she had a well-guarded rock for shot in the third end and Rocque threw her last away to concede the steal.
Rocque bounced back getting a deuce in three to tie it but Homan countered with a pair in five and stole one in six when Rocque was wide on a blank attempt. The two-time world junior champion Rocque took a single in seven but gave up the hammer for the eighth and final end.
Homan faced two with her last shot coming home but made no mistake to take out one.
The other semifinal game is set with Tracy Fleury facing Val Sweeting.
Fleury, from Sudbury, Ont., fended off a late charge from Winnipeg’s Kristy McDonald to win 8-4. The reigning Northern Ontario Scotties champion opened with a three-ender in the second and the teams split singles in three and four. Fleury stole one in the fifth to gain a four-point advantage but McDonald battled back in the sixth end and made a double raise to count three and narrow the gap to one.
McDonald took control of the seventh end as well with three counters but Fleury made the wide out-turn to get the one point and lead by two. Team McDonald couldn’t complete the comeback though and conceded two in the eight.
Sweeting, of Edmonton, got the point in the eighth to edge Sherry Middaugh of Coldwater, Ont., 5-4 in a back-and-forth battle. The teams split singles in two and three and Sweeting went ahead by two with a deuce in four. They alternated points again through five and six and Middaugh tied it 4-4 with with two in seven.
Men’s Quarterfinals Recap
Glenn Howard advanced to the National semifinals thanks to a beauty angle raise to count two in the final end and lift his Penetanguishene, Ont., team to a 5-4 victory over Calgary’s Kevin Koe on Saturday.
Team Howard will play Winnipeg’s Reid Carruthers, who edged reigning Olympic champion Brad Jacobs, of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., with a deuce coming home to win 7-5.
Howard, a four-time National champion, opened with the hammer and nailed an angle raise for a deuce in the first end. Koe blanked the second to retain the hammer for three and made an open hit for two of his own to tie it 2-2.
Koe made a double and his shooter rolled buried to force Howard to just one in the fourth. Koe blanked the fifth, grabbed shot rock with his last in six and added second for the deuce thanks to a measure to go up 4-3.
Meanwhile, Jacobs came up light on his last shot in the first and gave up a steal of one and the two teams alternated singles through the second, third and fourth ends. After Carruthers got his trey, Jacobs took two to narrow the gap to one point and stole one in seven to tie it 5-5.
Elsewhere, Brad Gushue of St. John’s earned a 9-4 win over Norway’s Thomas Ulsrud. Gushue, a three-time Grand Slam champion, scored two in the fourth and stole a pair in five to pull ahead 5-3. The 2006 Olympic gold medallist held Ulsrud to a single in six and scored four in the seventh to advance.
Gushue will play Toronto’s John Epping, who earned deuces in two and four, stole a pair in five and defeated two-time Brier winner Pat Simmons of Calgary 6-3.
The National is the third event — and second major — of the 2015-16 Pinty’s Grand Slam of Curling season and runs through to Sunday evening.