Tracy Fleury is creating happier recollections on the Scotties Event of Hearts in Thunder Bay, Ont., than three years in the past in the identical metropolis.
Fleury arrived on the 2022 Canadian ladies’s curling championship able to skip a wild-card workforce in an enviornment empty of followers due to COVID-19 restrictions.
Fleury caught the virus. She spent all however the final three video games quarantined in her lodge room watching on tv as her workforce competed with out her.
“It was a troublesome week and an odd time for positive,” Fleury recalled. “It was a difficult week not figuring out once I would be capable of play, and really isolating being in a lodge away from your loved ones and workforce for that lengthy.”
Three years later, the 38-year-old from Sudbury, Ont., is Rachel Homan’s vice in Thunder Bay and a driver of the workforce success in six straight wins to open the championship. Fleury owned the highest capturing share amongst all thirds at virtually 88 per cent Wednesday.
“It’s good to really be capable of exit and discover town and check out the eating places,” she mentioned.
Homan, Fleury and entrance finish Emma Miskew and Sarah Wilkes went undefeated to win the Canadian title in 2024 and likewise declare a world championship. The Ottawa Curling Membership foursome is on one other run in Thunder Bay with a playoff berth secured early.
“The aim, in fact, is to win it, however there’s a whole lot of alternative ways to do this, proper?” Fleury mentioned. “We simply go one recreation at a time and attempt to deliver our greatest.”
Homan’s sixth win was a 7-4 resolution over New Brunswick’s Melissa Adams (2-4) within the morning. Whereas the defending champions had been comfortably alone atop Pool A heading into the night draw towards Nunavut, the tussling to proceed taking part in past Thursday was tense behind them and over in Pool B.
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The highest three groups in every pool of 9 advance and battle Friday for 4 Web page playoff berths. Sunday’s winner on the Fort William Gardens represents Canada on the world championship March 15-23 in Uijeongbu, South Korea, and earns $100,000 in prize cash.
Alberta’s Selena Sturmay and Kayla Skrlik and B.C.’s Corryn Brown had been tied at 4-2 and Saskatchewan’s Nancy Martin was 4-3 behind Homan.
Ontario’s Danielle Inglis reached 5-1 and Quebec’s Laurie St-Georges was 5-2 to steer Pool B. 4-time Hearts champion Kerri Einarson of Manitoba produced a second straight comeback victory to get to 4-2.
With no tiebreaker video games, head-to-head outcomes resolve ties for third. If wanted, the following tiebreaker is rating the cumulative distances of last-stone attracts that precede every draw.
Inglis stealing factors within the tenth and eleventh in an 8-6 win over Manitoba’s Kate Cameron was the equal of a four-point swing within the standings in Pool B.
“We’ve had some massive wins, however that’s our greatest win to this point,” mentioned Inglis, whose workforce curls out of the Ottawa Hunt and Golf Membership.
Cameron, whose workforce completed third final yr in Calgary, ticked a guard on an tried hit within the tenth and was mild on a draw for a bit of the button within the further to drop to 3-3.
St-Georges was an 8-4 winner over Yukon’s Bayly Scoffin. With season veterans Jamie Sinclair at vice and three-time Hearts champ Lisa Weagle at lead, St-Georges feels her workforce has what it takes to be a playoff workforce.
“It might imply the world, for positive,” St-Georges mentioned. “It’s been a very long time since Quebec’s been within the playoffs, so I believe it’s alternative. However we’re not like getting forward of ourselves. We’re simply specializing in having meal tonight, possibly just a little drink after which attempt to come again robust tomorrow.”
Einarson’s 9-6 win over Nova Scotia’s Christina Black (4-2) was virtually as Houdini-like as her nice escape towards Cameron the earlier night when her workforce was down 7-2 after 5.
Trailing Black 5-1 after 5 ends as Einarson’s draw weight abandoned, her workforce scored two within the sixth, stole two within the seventh and one other single within the eighth.
“I advised myself, ‘both preserve combating or get off the sheet’ and I simply saved combating,” mentioned Einarson, who observed in early ends that her capturing share displayed on the centre-ice scoreboard learn 25 per cent.
“Ouch. That hurts,” the skip mentioned. “I simply knew ‘preserve throwing it Kerri, simply preserve placing stress on them and hopefully we’ll get some errors’ and we did.”
Manitoba’s Kaitlyn Lawes (4-3) stayed in competition with an 8-4 win over Northwest Territories’ Kerry Galusha (2-4).
© 2025 The Canadian Press
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