Still undefeated

Krista McCarville is feeling a little under the weather, but it didn’t stop her and her teammates from running the table during round-robin play at the Ontario Scotties Tournament of Hearts.

The Fort William Curling Club foursome completed their perfect 9-0 run with an 8-5 win Friday afternoon over Sarnia’s Carrie Lindner rink, and will take on Tracy Horgan on Saturday afternoon in the 1-2 page playoff.

The winner of that game advances to the final. The loser will await the winner of Saturday night’s semifinal.

Lindner will play Jacqueline Harrison on Friday night in tiebreaker to decide the final playoff spot. Harrison dropped a 7-6 decision to Mississauga’s Catherine Auld (6-3), who took third spot and will play in Saturday afternoon’s 3-4 page playoff for the right to advance to the semifinal.

McCarville, who beat Horgan 7-4 in the round robin, said she’s expecting a little more from her the second time around.

"I don’t think they had their best game against us, where I know they’ll be fighting a little bit harder, especially being in the 1-2 game," McCarville said.

"You do have a second life, but you don’t want it. You want to go straight to that final. So I think they’re going to definitely come out a lot harder than they did in the round robin game."

Horgan made easy work of her final round robin opponent on Friday, dismissing Peterborough’s Lisa Farnell 12-3 in just six ends.

A year after finishing 4-5 at the provincial qualifier, the 23-year-old’s plan of attack is a simple one.

"We’ve just got to make more shots, I guess, just try to keep it close," Horgan said. "It’s going to be tough once again, but it will be nice to have the 1-2 game. There’s less pressure, because it’s not like a sudden-death game, so maybe that will help calm our nerves."

It was business as usual for McCarville on Friday, as she leapt out to an commanding early lead, scoring three in the second, one in the fourth and stealing two in the fifth when Lindner’s final shot came up short and failed to dislodge the two stones her opponent had ringing the button.

Trouble found McCarville, lead Kari MacLean, second Ashley Miharija and third Tara George in the sixth, when the Thunder Bay skip left Lindner an easy tap-back for two that cut the lead to 6-3.

In the seventh McCarville missed an angle raise that could have put the game away, but instead of scoring two, she gave up a steal of one and her advantage dropped to two.

"Her first shot was a really good freeze. It kind of angled exactly where we couldn’t hit it really. I missed my first shot and then I basically just had the run-back on my last shot. It was really no harm. We gave up a steal of one, not the end of the world. We were still up two," she said.

McCarville rebounded in the eighth, scoring a pair, the second by a matter of inches on a measurement, to go up 8-4, and ran Lindner out of rocks in the 10^th to clinch the victory.
MacLean said they don’t plan on doing anything differently as the playoffs get set to begin.

"We’ve just been talking with our coach, keeping everything in perspective. We’ve been in this position before. So we’re not really as concerned about the record as just being in the 1-2 game, which has happened the last two years," MacLean said.

In other play, Thunder Bay’s Marlo Dahl (1-8) wrapped up her Ontario Scotties debut on a sour note, falling 6-2 to former champion Jen Hanna (4-5) of Ottawa. On Sheet 7, Julie Hastings made quick work of Cochrane’s Krista Mayrand, thumping her 11-1 in five ends.