Two-win day keeps Team Homan in playoff hunt in women’s curling

Monday proved to be a successful confidence-building day for Rachel Homan and her team, who posted two victories to keep alive their slim playoff hopes at Milano Cortina 2026.

After snapping their three-game losing streak by beating China 10-5 in the morning draw, Homan and company followed with a 9-6 win over Sayaka Yoshimura of Japan in the evening draw.

The wins improved Canada’s record to 3-3 with a huge game coming up Tuesday morning against unbeaten Anna Hasselborg of Sweden. Canada will then play Italy (1-5) on Wednesday and Korea (4-2) on Thursday to finish off the round robin.

“It’s huge,” Homan said of the back-to-back wins. “We’re making a lot of big shots as a team and trying to be as precise as we can. Obviously, it feels good but still lots of work to do.”

Third Tracy Fleury said there was no surprise among the team that they have bounced back after the three losses.

“I think just resiliency,” she said when asked what was behind the turnaround. “Our team has been in challenging situations before, so it’s just come out and be precise.”

As for Tuesday, Fleury said it will be a challenge.

“Tough day tomorrow. I mean they’re all tough games; Sweden is playing very well. but I think we’re trending and we’re playing well too, so it should be a good battle.”

While Homan is known for her ability to make heavy weight shots, the 36-year-old originally from Ottawa showed again on Monday she has all the shots necessary for success. And draws were largely the difference in Canada’s win over Japan.

Homan, a mother of three now living in Beaumont, Alta., had an 89 percent success rate with her draws compared with just 65 percent for Yoshimura. The inability of the Japan skip to find her draw weight until the late ends was a constant problem and also caused difficulties for her teammates calling the sweeping on her shots.

Sweeping proved to be a major factor in the late ends for Canada. Unlike many teams who shake hands when down by four points after eight ends, Japan did not give up when trailing 8-4. Instead, they jumped on a couple of half-shots by Canada to score two in the ninth and forced Homan into a last-rock draw in the tenth.

Japan got two counters behind guards early in the end. After a Homan double take-out attempt got only one, Yoshimura drew the four foot and Japan was sitting three. Facing the prospect of possibly giving up three and the victory, Homan’s last rock draw was dragged to the button by tremendous sweeping by second Emma Miskew and lead Sarah Wilkes to preserve the victory.

Japan put Canada back on its heel by scoring two in a first end that saw as many missed shots as completed ones. With both teams trying to figure out the ice, Japan had a draw sail through the house, Canada had a total whiff on a wide open take-out, Japan had a tap back hit a guard that turned into an angled double runback take-out, and Homan missed on a runback that she rarely ever misses. The end concluded with an open draw for Yoshimura for the deuce.

Canada responded immediately with a deuce of its own in the second and took control with three in the third end. Yoshimura was three feet heavy with her final stone draw against three Canadian counters.

There were sporadic singles for five ends until the ninth made the finish interesting.

Much to the noisy delight of the boisterous fans in the stands, Stefania Constantini guided host Italy to its first win, 7-2 over the United States (Tabitha Peterson). Korea (Gim Eun-ji) beat China (Wang Rui) 10-9 and Switzerland (Silvana Tirinzoni) defeated Great Britain (Rebecca Morrison) 10-6.

With four draws remaining, the standings see Sweden at 6-0, the United States, Korea and Switzerland all at 4-2, Canada and Denmark at 3-3, China and Great Britain at 2-4 with Japan and Italy at 1-5.