McCarville still perfect

The eighth end was shaping up to be an ugly one for Krista McCarville in draw five of the Ontario Scotties Tournament of Hearts.

With 10 rocks of various colours crowding the house, including three of her opponent Julie Hastings in scoring position, McCarville studied her options. She called a timeout to consult with coach Rick Lang, then calmly slid back to the hack and made the shot, threading her final stone through the narrowest of openings, landing it in the four-foot for a single.

The point put her up 5-3 at the time, and she went on to beat the Thornhill-based Hastings 5-4 at the Port Arthur Curling Club to improve to 5-0 in her bid for a third straight appearance at nationals, beginning later this month in Sault Ste. Marie.

"That was a big shot. They were sitting three and it was looking a little scary, and I hadn’t shot a draw down that path. But the girls knew a time to give me and it worked out, we got our one, which was really big," said McCarville after the match, anxious to reunite with her three-month-old daughter Bella, who she could hear crying at various points in the afternoon.

McCarville, lead Ashley Miharija, second Kari MacLean and third Tara George started with the hammer and played rope-a-dope with Team Hastings, which also includes lead Katrina Collins, second Stacey Smith and third Christy Trombley.

The sides blanked the first two ends, but McCarville made a double takeout with her final stone to score two in the third and take the early lead.

Hastings fought back with one in the fourth and stole one in the fifth when McCarville missed a tough angle raise on her final shot, instead hitting her own stone head on and crashing it harmlessly out of the rings.

In the sixth it was a Hastings mistake that put the hometown team ahead for good. Needing a draw to force McCarville into making an testy shot to score one, the Baview Golf and Country Club representative sailed her final shot of the end through the house, leaving McCarville an easy tap-back for a deuce and in the driver’s seat.

"We knew we had to play our best to beat them," McCarville said, recollecting last year’s provincial Scotties one-two playoff in Oakville, where her foursome scored an 8-5 win over Hastings, who fell to 2-3 after Wednesday’s loss.

It wasn’t quite as happy a result for Thunder Bay’s other representative at this year’s Scotties. Marlo Dahl’s squad dropped a 5-2 decision to Sarnia’s Carrie Lidner to remain winless at 0-5.

Next up for McCarville, on Wednesday night, is Sudbury’s Tracy Horgan, who has surprised with four wins in five outings, after winning just four times all week a year ago.

Horgan, 23, said it won’t be easy taking out an opponent with so much experience and three titles in the past four provincial championships.

She didn’t hold out much hope, after rallying to beat Cochrane’s Krista Maynard 7-5 in Draw 5.

"I think we’re just going to have to bring our ‘A’ game. It’s obviously a very strong team. They had a great performance at the Olympic trials. We watched them and it’s going to be a really tough game. Hopefully we can keep it close," Horgan said.

McCarville, despite all but assuring herself a berth in the playoffs this weekend, isn’t taking anything for granted with four games left to play in the round robin.

"We’re not there yet. We still have a lot of games to go and a lot of great teams to play. We definitely have to play really good to beat the rest of the teams," McCarville said. "The target seems to be growing and growing. But we just forget about that and be the team that we are and that’s all we can do really."

Dahl will play Maynard on Wednesday night.


Standings
Team           W  L
McCarville     5   0
Horgan          4   1
Auld              3   2
Harrison          3   2
Lindner            3   2
Farnell             2   3
Hanna             2   3
Hastings         2   3
Maynard         1   4
Dahl                0   5