Swiss women remain on a roll as Team GB set new Olympic points record in the curling
swiss curling team
After Tuesday evening’s third session of round-robin play in the Sochi 2014 women’s curling competition at the Ice Cube Curling Centre, Switzerland remain undefeated and sit at the top of the rankings with maximum points.
However it was Great Britain who picked up the result of the night as they overwhelmed USA with a 12-3 win in just six ends.
Eve Muirhead’s world champions from Great Britain had single-point steals in each of the first two ends, for a 2-0 lead. USA got on the scoreboard with one point in the third end and then made mistake after mistake in the fourth end while Great Britain rolled stone after stone into the house.
Eventually USA skip Erika Brown’s last draw rubbed a front guard and lay open, leaving Muirhead with a simple hit and stay to score what is an Olympic record-breaking seven points (in one end) for a 9-1 lead.
USA managed to score two points in the fifth end and then, after the half-time break, the British women finished the game off when Muirhead played a perfect double take-out to score three points for a 12-3 score-line, after which the Americans conceded defeat.
New Olympic record
Later Great Britain skip Eve Muirhead said: “That was a lot more like us. We played really well. We said right after yesterday’s game that the ice was especially quick and we all learned from what we did wrong yesterday and we all came out firing tonight.»
When told her score of seven points in the fourth end was an Olympic record, she reacted with delight: “Oh wow!”
The game between Republic of Korea and Switzerland was a much closer contest. The teams were tied at 2-2 at the half-time break, but Switzerland moved into a clear lead in the sixth end when Korean skip Jisun Kim was heavy and wide with her final stone.
A further two points in the eighth end and a single point in the tenth end were enough to give Switzerland an 8-6 victory.
Afterwards, Swiss skip Mirjam Ott said: “That’s another win, so that’s a really good start for us. The ice was a little bit different, and also Korea struggled, but we got a steal of three and that was a big achievement. We just have to go game for game now.”
Like USA, Denmark stay locked at the bottom of the table without a win after three games. They went down 8-3 to Japan, who scored in each of the first four ends to establish a 5-0 lead, before the Danes conceded after eight ends.
“We lost the first game against Korea. This game we really focused and played a lot better out on the ice. We played a simpler game which worked better,” said Japan’s skip Yumie Funayama.
In the evening’s other game, Russia lost their unbeaten record, going down 7-5 to China.
The hosts took an early lead and went into the half-time break 3-1 up. But China fought back with two points in the sixth end to level at 3-3, before going on to seal their first win.
“We’re so, so happy because Russia played really well,” said Chinese skip Wang. “But that was just the second game, so it means nothing so far.”