VICTORIA, February 27, 2009 (CCA) — Team Canada’s Jennifer Jones took another step towards a date in Sunday’s final at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts Canadian women’s curling championship Saturday at the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre.
Jones and her defending Canadian and world championship team from Winnipeg — third Cathy Overton-Clapham, second Jill Officer and lead Dawn Askin — turned back Saskatchewan’s Stefanie Lawton 8-6 in the Page playoff three-four game on Saturday.
With the win, Team Canada advanced to Saturday night’s semifinal against Marie-France Larouche of Quebec at 8 p.m. (all times Atlantic) on TSN.
Jones needed to make a draw to the four-foot to beat Saskatchewan, and the win wasn’t secure until her final stone nestled up to the backing in the four-foot.
“We like to keep the crowd excited,” said Jones. “Most of our games are pretty close. Most of the quarter-inches, I would say 90 per cent of them, were going against us for the first two-thirds of the week. Now they’re in our favour, and hopefully we can keep that going tonight. That’s what we practise for, this is what we love to do, and win our lose, we sure had a lot of fun.”
Jones forced Saskatchewan to one in the first end, then came back with two in the second, and posted stolen single points in the third and fourth ends to take control.
Lawton — backed up by third Marliese Kasner, second Sherri Singler and lead Lana Vey — fought her way back, and got deuces in the seventh and ninth ends to cut Canada’s lead to one, and force Jones to make the shot for the win in the 10th.
“We played hard. We’re disappointed, definitely, but they made some great shots and we just couldn’t follow it up,” said Lawton. “We had a great week. I’m very proud of the girls. We played hard and we played with everything that we had. Great week.”
The winner of the Canada-Quebec game on Saturday night will play Marla Mallett of B.C. in Sunday’s championship game at 9 p.m. on TSN.
The winner of Sunday’s final advances to the world women’s championship, set for March 21 to 29 in Gangneung, South Korea.