VANCOUVER (World Curling Federation)– Halfway through women’s session six, it appeared that all four matches at the 2009 World Junior Curling Championships would end in upsets.
There was two-time defending champions Scotland, losing to Denmark. Winless Japan was putting the boots to Sweden. The Czech Republic was in the lead over the United States. And there was France, leading mighty Canada.
In the end, two of the stronger teams made strong comebacks – Scotland and the United States – while Canada and Sweden failed to deliver.
Down 6-2 at the break, Scotland’s Eve Muirhead amassed six points over the final five ends to defeat Denmark’s Mette de Neegaard by an 8-7 count. Alexandra Carlson of the United States was down 5-3 at the break, but ended up scoring 10 points – eight of them on steals – to wallop Anna Kubeskova of the Czech Republic 13-5.
On the other end of the spectrum, Japan’s Satsuki Fujisawa earned her first victory with an emphatic 9-4 win over Sweden’s Anna Hasselborg. And 17-year old Marie Coulot of France held off a listless Kaitlyn Lawes of Canada, beating the front-running hosts 7-4 to end their four-game winning streak.
“They (France) made shots and we didn’t,” declared Lawes, who actually outpaced Coulot in shooting percentage, 74 to 70.
“She was making everything. They made the key shots and we didn’t capitalize on our opportunities early on.
“It’s tough to go through these things undefeated, so we can only build on this.”
Coulot qualified for the World Juniors through the European Junior Challenge competition held in January, and says her only goal is to stay in the championship bracket, and not return to the challenge grind.
“I’m very surprised,” said Coulot, who has only been curling for four years.
“I think we are all confident but Canada is a very good team.”
Canada and Scotland are now tied for first place at 4-1, with Russia and Switzerland, who were both idle, a game back at 3-1. The United States is 3-2, Denmark and France are both 2-3, and three teams are tied at 1-4 – the Czech Republic, Japan and Sweden.
The Vancouver Olympic Centre will host the curling and wheelchair curling competitions at the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games next year.
Live scoring, statistics and shot-by-shot graphics of every match are available at: http://www.wjcc.curlit.com
with results mirrored at the WCF Results website at:
http://results.worldcurling.org
The event website is located at: http://www.wjcc2009.com