We’re previous the halfway mark of the season and two groups stand tall above the remainder of the sphere within the Grand Slam of Curling.
Scotland’s Group Bruce Mouat has received all three males’s titles within the collection to start the 2024-25 marketing campaign whereas Canada’s Group Rachel Homan has reached all three ladies’s finals with back-to-back title wins within the final two.
For Homan, it’s a continuation of the earlier season the place her Ottawa-based crew captured Canadian and world championships, two Grand Slams and completed with an unbelievable 67-7 document.
Right here’s a capsule have a look at every Grand Slam of Curling occasion thus far this season and a fast have a look at what’s forward in 2025.
HEARINGLIFE TOUR CHALLENGE (OCT. 1-6, 2024; CHARLOTTETOWN)
Gotta catch ’em all! Mouat kicked off the Grand Slam of Curling season by checking the final title he was lacking from the checklist. Coincidentally, Mouat needed to defeat the one different males’s skip who had completed that feat.
Mouat beat Canada’s Group Brad Gushue with a decisive 10-3 victory to seize the HearingLife Tour Problem Tier 1 males’s title and turn into simply the second males’s skip (and third total) to win all 5 completely different occasions within the collection. It was additionally the seventh profession Grand Slam of Curling championship for Mouat, whose crew posted an ideal 6-0 document within the event.
“Considering again to my early days on this sport, dreaming about making an attempt to win certainly one of these was one thing that appeared unattainable,” Mouat stated. “To lastly get seven and to win each single certainly one of them is a surreal second. It’s one thing very particular to all of us, all 4 of us.”
Canada’s Group Kerri Einarson was already going through uncertainty with lead Briane Harris provisionally suspended after testing optimistic for a banned substance (Harris has but to play this season as she continues to await a choice on her enchantment). Second Shannon Birchard has additionally been out of the lineup as she recovers from a knee damage. Whereas Karlee Burgess has joined the crew for the rest of the season, Einarson relied upon tremendous spares to fill in for Birchard in the course of the first half with Daybreak McEwen approaching board for the HearingLife Tour Problem.
After dropping to Italy’s Group Stefania Constantini to start out the HearingLife Tour Problem, Einarson rolled off six consecutive victories en path to the title, together with a 5-4 win over Homan.
That accomplished a full-circle second for Einarson, who claimed the inaugural Tour Problem Tier 2 title again in 2015.
“It’s an incredible feeling,” Einarson stated. “I do know after I was arising into the Slams and having to win that Tier 2 simply to get into them. Now right here we’re successful Tier 1. Our laborious work has actually paid off.”
Homan additionally fell to Constantini in the course of the triple knockout spherical, however these losses have been her solely two defeats in the course of the season with a formidable 40-2 document and rattling off a 23-game successful streak.
Talking of the Tier 2, Saskatoon’s Group Rylan Kleiter and Halifax’s Group Christina Black captured these titles to affix the elite ranks in future Grand Slam of Curling occasions. Kleiter defeated Norway’s Group Magnus Ramsfjell 6-5 in an additional finish in the course of the males’s last and Black beat Japan’s Group Sayaka Yoshimura 7-3 within the ladies’s last.
Black competed within the KIOTI Nationwide and hung with the world’s finest by reaching the quarterfinals whereas Kleiter will compete within the WFG Masters.
CO-OP CANADIAN OPEN (NOV. 5-10, 2024; NISKU, ALTA.)
Mouat and Homan entered the Co-op Canadian Open because the reigning champions and each efficiently defended their titles.
Group Mouat continued its red-hot run, this time going 7-0, and defeated Gushue once more within the last by a rating of 6-2. Each Mouat and third Grant Hardie shot 98 per cent, second Bobby Lammie was an ideal 100 per cent and lead Hammy McMillan Jr. fired a “low” 96 per cent in the course of the recreation.
“It feels actually good,” Mouat stated. “It was an unbelievable recreation, we hardly missed a shot and all the fellows all through the crew have been taking part in superb. I’m actually happy with us.”
Group Gushue had a unique look although having parted methods with second E.J. Harnden proper after the HearingLife Tour Problem amid a surprising shuffle among the many prime Canadian males’s groups. Gushue recruited former skip Brendan Bottcher to affix his crew at second. Skips Kevin Koe, Reid Carruthers and Matt Dunstone additionally made lineup tweaks in the course of the fall, with Harnden becoming a member of Group Dunstone.
Homan went 7-0 on the ladies’s facet and received near residence for the resident of Beaumont, Alta.
“It’s so cool,” Homan stated. “We introduced this occasion right here, we have been hoping it’d be a hit and it was bought out all weekend. It’s simply superior that we may very well be within the last and take it residence for Beaumont.”
Group Homan defeated Switzerland’s Group Silvana Tirinzoni 7-5 in a repeat of final season’s world championship last. Trailing 3-2, Homan pulled off a shot-of-the-year candidate to attain three factors within the fourth finish to leap again into the lead for good.
“I wasn’t fairly certain if it was there,” Homan stated. “Making an attempt to go for 2, you at all times hope for the most effective and simply feathered that gap.”
KIOTI NATIONAL (NOV. 26 – DEC. 1, 2024; ST. JOHN’S, N.L.)
The Grand Slam of Curling heaved away to outdated St. John’s for the KIOTI Nationwide with a packed home available all week on the Mary Brown’s Centre. St. John’s personal Group Gushue was clearly the group favorite though the cheers have been loud for all of the groups.
Group Brad Jacobs confronted Gushue in the course of the quarterfinals in an intense conflict between two of the highest Canadian golf equipment. Jacobs led by one level in the course of the seventh and opted to surrender a steal to retain the hammer for the ultimate finish. That call was met with a refrain of boos from the group and Jacobs embraced the villain function by elevating his arms for extra and twirling his finger.
The plan labored out for Jacobs, who scored a single within the eighth to win 6-5 and advance.
“To start with, all of us beloved it,” Jacobs stated. “There have been lots of apologies from lots of people. Lots of people truly felt prefer it was uncalled for however you understand what? Curling wants extra of that.
“In another sport on the market, there’s a crew that individuals wish to win and there’s the villain and I do know we’re each Brads, the Battle of the Brads for what number of years now? Properly over a decade. We embrace that. That’s good theatre, that’s good TV, that’s good for the game and that makes it value it for all of these bums in these seats.
“I additionally thought to myself, if any particular person can attain some extent of their life the place they’re in an area and so they’re booed by 6,000-plus folks, they’re in all probability doing one thing proper of their life. We embraced it. I do know that we rained on the parade a bit bit however they get lots of rain out right here, so that they’re used to it, proper?”
Jacobs topped Scotland’s Group Ross Whyte 6-3 within the semifinals to arrange a championship tilt in opposition to Mouat.
Group Mouat sustained its first loss within the Grand Slam season throughout round-robin play with a 6-3 defeat in opposition to Group John Shuster of the USA. The squad bought again on monitor successful 4 straight heading into the ultimate.
Mouat took management late, scoring deuces within the sixth and eighth ends to defeat Jacobs 5-3. That made it three straight Grand Slam of Curling males’s championships for Mouat and 9 total as he took sole possession of fourth place on the all-time males’s title wins checklist.
“It’s form of unbelievable,” stated Mouat, who received his first Grand Slam seven years beforehand on the Nationwide. “I noticed the footage of us again in 2017 after we received it, so there are just a few extra wrinkles on the face and some extra gray hairs as properly. It’s unbelievable to suppose again to that way back and understand the journey was simply starting for us then.
“The legends that we’re now being acknowledged with is simply unbelievable to all of us as a result of we grew up figuring out these folks or desirous to get near the place they probably have been and to really understand that we’re doing it’s unbelievable.”
The Group Homan prepare stored rolling by means of the ladies’s division, posting one other good 7-0 document. Homan scored two factors within the eighth finish to elevate her squad over Sweden’s Group Anna Hasselborg 6-5 within the last.
Do not let the unblemished document idiot you as this was no cakewalk. Homan additionally wanted late rallies to beat Yoshimura within the quarterfinals and South Korea’s Group Eun-jung Kim within the semifinals.
“Unbelievable,” Homan stated. “It was undoubtedly a unique solution to win it in the long run. We had two battles and come-from-behind wins within the quarters and semis. We’re simply making an attempt to maintain taking part in higher within the playoffs and making an attempt to handle these misses a bit bit extra.”
Homan has now received a document 17 Grand Slam of Curling ladies’s titles and is one away from tying legendary males’s skip Kevin Martin for essentially the most amongst all gamers.
WFG MASTERS (JAN. 14-19; GUELPH, ONT.)
The Grand Slam of Curling returns to motion subsequent week with the WFG Masters and the hype has been constructing with full-event and weekend passes already bought out.
It’s the second time the Sleeman Centre will host a Grand Slam of Curling occasion following the 2010 Nationwide. That was again when the occasion was a males’s invitational with Gushue capturing his first profession title within the collection.
Now that includes males’s and girls’s divisions and a few fascinating storylines forward, it is certain to be a must-watch occasion. Will Mouat make it 4 in a row? Can Homan tie Martin? Or will a combo-breaker disrupt the streaks?
There’s additionally a brand new rule that will probably be examined in the course of the occasion the place groups will lose the hammer in the event that they clean two consecutive ends. Oh, did we point out there was a draft to find out the swimming pools the place groups chosen their opponents? Quite the intrigue.
Final season’s WFG Masters was held in Saskatoon with Italy’s Group Joël Retornaz efficiently defending the lads’s title, and successful a 3rd straight Grand Slam, after defeating first-time finalist Group Ross Whyte of Scotland 3-2. No shock, Homan took the ladies’s title, her fourth on the Masters, doubling up on Tirinzoni 8-4.
PLAYERS’ CHAMPIONSHIP (APRIL 8-13; TORONTO)
After a little bit of a break, the Grand Slam of Curling season resumes with the Gamers’ Championship, returning to Toronto’s Mattamy Athletic Centre for the tenth time since 2013.
Solely the highest 12 males’s groups and prime 12 ladies’s groups on the planet primarily based on the year-to-date rankings obtain invites to the celebrated last main event of the season.
Gushue captured his fifteenth Grand Slam of Curling males’s title on the occasion final season together with his crew’s thrilling victory within the males’s last over Retornaz. Gushue’s draw shot with the final rock of the sport to win 7-6 even earned a tip of the cap from his opponent. Tirinzoni will return because the defending ladies’s champion after topping Sweden’s Group Isabella Wrana 6-5.
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