Ontario women closing in on first; Northern Ontario lead men at Juniors
SALMON ARM, BC, February 6 (CCA)…Ontario, skipped by Rachel Homan of Ottawa, is one step closer to clinching first place at the M&M Meat Shops Canadian Juniors and a bye to Sunday’s final, after wiping out the Northwest Territories, 13-2, in Draw 16 action Friday morning at the Sunwave Centre.
Ontario’s record is now 9-2, with a final contest against Saskatchewan this evening at 7:00 pm.
After a big win over defending champion Manitoba yesterday afternoon, Homan’s squad was edged by host British Columbia, skipped by Kelly Shimizu of Richmond, 7-6 last night to fall into a tie with Alberta (Casey Scheidegger of Lethbridge) for top spot.
Alberta had a morning bye but must finish ahead of Ontario to claim first place, since Homan beat Scheidegger, 5-4 during the round robin. Alberta plays Newfoundland and Labrador and Nova Scotia today.
“It’s a long week, ” said Homan. “We can’t play it perfect for 12 games in a row. We were bound to have an off game and I think we may have had an off game against British Columbia last night. But they played really well against us.
“We’ve just got to focus against Saskatchewan (tonight), just one game left. If we win that, we’re first. We don’t want to think about what Alberta is doing.”
In other games, defending champion Manitoba, skipped by Kaitlyn Lawes of Winnipeg, stayed alive with a dramatic 9-6 victory over Nova Scotia (Marie Christianson of Halifax). Lawes stole single points in the eighth and ninth ends, then stole a deuce in the 10th when Christianson was light on a draw. Manitoba is now temporarily in third place with a 7-4 mark, and plays New Brunswick this afternoon in its round robin finale.
British Columbia, which also had a morning bye, is at 6-4, with games remaining against Northern Ontario and Quebec.
New Brunswick (Ashley Howard of Moncton) stole one in eight, two in nine and one in the 10th end to defeat Saskatchewan (Brooklyn Lemon of Regina), 7-4. Meanwhile, Prince Edward Island (Erin Carmody of Summerside) kept its slim playoff hopes alive, edging Yukon (Sarah Koltun of Whitehorse), 7-6, taking two in the 10th end to improve to 6-5.
In men’s, Prince Edward Island’s Brett Gallant of Charlottetown has clinched at least a berth in Saturday’s semi-final after an 8-4 win over Yukon (Thomas Scoffin of Whitehorse). Gallant, who finished the runner-up in 2007 and third place finisher at the Juniors last year, improved to 8-3.
Northern Ontario (Dylan Johnston of Thunder Bay) is 8-2 while Alberta (Kevin Yablonski of Calgary) is 7-3, as both were idle this morning.
The next closest teams, with 6-5 records, are Manitoba, New Brunswick and Saskatchewan, but they need Alberta to drop both remaining games in order to create a tiebreaker.
Manitoba (Sam Good of Winnipeg) was a 7-2 winner over Nova Scotia (Paul Dexter of St. Andrews), while New Brunswick (Steve Burgess of Fredericton) was felled by Saskatchewan (Mike Armstrong of Saskatoon) 8-5. Also, Ontario (Bowie Abbis-Mills of Waterloo) defeated Northwest Territories (Colin Miller of Yellowknife), 9-4.
The PEI teams wrap up their round robin play against the Territories in the 7 pm (11 pm Atlantic) draw. Carmody must win this game, and Manitoba and BC must lose a game to force a tiebreaker.
The round robin concludes with draws at 2:00 pm and 7:00 pm local time, after which the first place teams advance to their respective finals on Sunday, while the second and third place teams meet in semi-finals on Saturday.
TSN will carry the women’s final live on February 8 at 11:30 am PT/ 3:30 pm Atlantic, followed by the men’s final at 4:00 pm PT/8:00 pm AT.