YORKTON - The Kerri Einarson foursome out of Gimli, MB., made it three straight capturing the Scotties Tournament of Hearts, emblematic of the Canadian Women’s Championship in curling.
The foursome, including lead Briane Meilleur, second Shannon Birchard, third Val Sweeting and skip Kerri Einarson, headed into the Scottie’s tourney in Northern Ontario as the defending champions, and curled their way through the 18-team field to earn a berth in the final. The run included going undefeated in pool play, with the only blemish on the week a playoff loss 8-6 to New Brunswick’s Andrea Crawford led team.
Einarson would rebound to make the final where they topped the Krista McCarville-led rink out of Northern Ontario 9-6.
Einarson said the third championship is just as sweet as the first two.
“Yah, it definitely is,” she told Yorkton This Week in a telephone interview. “It is very hard to win the first one,” she added, noting it never gets easier.
“We’re just over the moon excited.”
In some ways the third win might even be a bit more special coming in a curling season when the team wasn’t playing as well as they had hoped early on.
“We were very disappointed after our performance in the trials (to represent Canada at the current Olympics),” said Einarson.
So while Jennifer Jones prepared to head to Beijing, Einarson said they had to take a breath and ready for the Scotties. She said the team sat down and simply decided to focus on the Canadian championships.
The discussion came down to getting the team back to some basics.
“We didn’t want to put any more pressure on ourselves. We wanted to just go out and have fun,” said Einarson.
It helped that the team was experienced at the Canadian championships.
“We knew what it takes, what we needed to bring to the table to perform,” said Einarson.
Once on the ice it was stay relaxed and “enjoy every single moment out there,” she said.
Up next for Einarson and her team will be the 2022 World Women's Curling Championship in Prince George, B.C. March 19 to 27.
Einarson said the team is taking a quick breath and then getting back on the ice to ready for the event.
“We’re taking some down time, some time with family and friends soaking in all the excitement,” she said.
But, preparation time will be important this year because the rules the world championships will be played under are changing.
Rule changes include:
— Thinking time per end will replace the current thinking time rules: There will be four minutes allotted to each of the first five ends and four minutes and 15 seconds for the remaining ends. This replaces the current 38 minutes for all 10 ends.
— No tick shot rule: If a stone is touching the centre line within the free guard zone it may not be moved by an opponent’s stone until after the fifth stone of the end has been played.
— No extra ends in the round robin stage: Instead teams will designate one player to draw to the button, with the closest team earning an advantage. A points system will be used to determine standings, with three points for an outright win, two points to the team that wins the draw to the button and one point to the team that loses the draw.
Einarson said they’ll have to adapt.
“It does change things a little bit,” she said, but added she doesn’t see the changes being too difficult to deal with, even as a team noted as proficient making tick shots.
What Einarson is looking for in Prince George is a better finish than they had in the bubble in Calgary in 2021.
“Last year at the worlds we didn’t medal. We were disappointed,” she said, adding this year they feel better prepared in terms of having been there. “This year we know what to expect.”
