THUNDER BAY – Team Nova Scotia’s roller coaster ride of a match ended on a high – and more importantly, left them tied for first place in their pool at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts.
The game itself came down to the wire.
Skip Christina Black left a potential run-back double for the win with her final shot of the 10th end, but Kerry Galusha, the 22-time Scotties veteran, coming off an upset win earlier in the day over four-time champion Kerri Einarson, didn’t get the angle quite right and was only able to remove one stone, handing Nova Scotia a come-from-behind 11-10 win.
Nova Scotia led by three or more on three separate occasions, only to watch Galusha battle back each time, finally taking the lead with a well-constructed steal of three in the eighth.
Lead Karlee Everist, who called Thunder Bay home for the first 22 years of her life, said coming from behind is nothing new for Team Black, and though it’s not something they have to do as much anymore, it’s still good to have a trick or two in reserve, just in case, she said.
“I think we felt really good when we had hammer in the eighth end and we were up two. Then the three kind of came out of nowhere. We were set up really good and then (third) Jill (Brothers) and Christina had some unfortunate misses,” Everist said.
“It was just a matter of really just staying tough and believing in each other and saying those things out loud to each other.”
Everist said the Nova Scotia squad, which also includes second Jennifer Baxter, is right where it wants to be after five games.
“Our goal, for coming into today, was to have one loss. At the start of the tournament we said, by the time we get to Tuesday, we need to have only one loss, so we got to our goal, which is nice. We’re really set up nicely that as long as we can at least two of our next three, we should be in a good position,” Everist said.
They thought they were in good shape from the start of Tuesday night’s match, Black opening with a three in the first end. Galusha got two back in the second and stole another in the third, evening the game 3-3.
In the fourth, Galusha was out of options and tried to angle in off a Nova Scotia guard, facing a multitude of opposition rocks in the house. It failed and Black had an open hit for four, made it, though needed a measurement to confirm the final scoring stone.
Black left a hit for three, which Galusha pounced on, and all of a sudden, it was 7-6. Nova Scotia scored two in the sixth, but gave it all back and more an end later, Black unable to thread the needle and the Territories stole three and took a 10-9 lead.
Black was held to one in the ninth, giving up hammer in the 10th, but was able to outmaneuver Galusha to orchestrate the steal for the win, giving them a 4-1 record, tied with Ontario’s Daniel Inglish atop the Pool B standings.
“I think I almost threw up a little bit. That was really close,” Black said.
“That game, it was crazy. It was up and down. We’d have a really good end and then a end where all of a sudden they were just going to get a pile.”
Unlike Galusha (2-3), Einarson (3-2) was able to complete her comeback, rallying from 7-2 down against Manitoba’s Kate Cameron (3-2) to pull out a 10-9 win, keyed in part by a run-back double in the sixth for three that cut the lead to 7-5, and another three in the eighth that tied things up.
“We just kept hanging in there and after I made the shot for three the first time, I had a really good feeling we were going to come back to win it,” Einarson said.
The shot may have saved her week.
“I think so. I think for sure it did,” Einarson said.
“You don’t want to get to three losses and we knew we’d have to win out from here on out. We still have some really tough games left and our backs are against the wall and we’re going to keep fighting.”
In other action, Quebec’s Laurie St-George downed Newfoundland and Labrador 11-4 and Kaitlyn Lawes evened her record at 2-2 with an 11-4 win over Yukon.
