By Aadi Nair
CORTINA D’AMPEZZO, Italy, Feb 21 (Reuters) – Canada beat the United States 10-7 to claim the women’s curling bronze medal at the Winter Olympics on Saturday, as skip Rachel Homan ended her long wait for a Games medal.
Homan punched the air and embraced teammate Tracy Fleury after her counterpart Tabitha Peterson conceded with one throw remaining.
For Canada, the bronze was their first medal in the women’s event since the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, when Jennifer Jones’s team won gold.
While the colour might not be what Homan hoped for, seeing as her team were strong favourites for gold heading into the Games, it was still a testament to their performances in the last Olympic cycle.
They won the last two world championships, beating their closest rivals and four-times world champions Switzerland in both finals, and won three consecutive Grand Slam titles last year.
However, Homan’s record at the Olympics had been poor.
She participated in the past two Games, finishing sixth as skip of the women’s team in 2018 and once again ending up outside the qualification spots for the semi-finals in the mixed doubles in 2022.
“I’m just unbelievably proud of our week and our fight. We never gave up right to the end. Pulling for each other. When things were hard, we just pulled closer together and tried to figure out how to make the next one,” Homan said.
CLOSE GAME
Saturday’s clash was a much closer affair than the men’s, in which Switzerland blew Norway away, with both teams limiting each other’s scoring opportunities to leave the game tied at 2-2 after four ends.
The tide appeared to turn in Canada’s favour in the sixth end when U.S. skip Tabitha Peterson made inadequate contact with a Canadian stone and left Homan with a simple takeout shot for three points and a 5-3 lead.
Peterson did not let the setback affect her and produced an incredible draw for two in the next end to level at 5-5, a shot that drew applause from both sets of supporters at the Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium.
Still, Canada had smelt blood and pushed hard, capitalising on a failed triple-takeout to earn another three points with a straightforward draw.
While Peterson was able to make an improbable two-pointer in the penultimate end, Canada had a one-point lead as well as the hammer and closed out the win.
The U.S. were hoping to become the first American women’s team to win a curling medal at the Winter Games.
They had claimed their first Olympic victory over Canada in the round-robin stage last week, beating their neighbours 9-8.
“For me , this was my third Games, and this was my best finish as well. So you can’t under-emphasise that. It’s still a really good showing for us, and we’re really proud of our performance,” Peterson said.
Anna Hasselborg’s Sweden and Silvana Tirinzoni’s Switzerland face off for women’s gold on Sunday in the finale of the curling competition at the Milano Cortina Games.
(Reporting by Aadi Nair; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne and Ed Osmond)
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