STEINBACH, Man. — Business is about to pick up big time at the Crown Royal Players' Championship.
Wednesday marks the first full day of round-robin play, with a handful of teams playing two games. Will it be twice as nice or double trouble?
Stream all the action live on watch.rockchannel.com and keep it here for updates.
QUICK LINKS: DRAW SCHEDULE & RESULTS | STANDINGS | BROADCAST INFO
MUST-SEE MATCHES
The Crown Royal Players' Championship is the final tune-up for those teams heading to the Milano Cortina 2026 Olympic Winter Games.
For Team Bruce Mouat, Wednesday will serve as a direct preview. The Scottish squad faces Sweden's Team Niklas Edin in Draw 5 and Team Daniel Casper of the United States in Draw 7, two teams Mouat will meet again at the Winter Olympics.
Mouat and Edin most recently faced off in the semifinals of the European Curling Championships in November. Edin handed Mouat his first and only loss of the tournament with an 8-5 decision. While Edin also upended Switzerland's Team Yannick Schwaller to earn the gold medal, Mouat bounced back to defeat Italy's Team Joël Retornaz for bronze.
The world No. 1 Mouat holds a 3-1 advantage over Edin in the four games they've played this season, including two in the Grand Slam series.
Canada's Team Rachel Homan and Japan's Team Satsuki Fujisawa clash in Draw 6. The two teams squared off in the HearingLife Canadian Open quarterfinals just before the Christmas break, with Fujisawa coming out on top. That also ended Homan's record streak of consecutive Grand Slam finals at eight.
Team Anna Hasselborg and Team Isabella Wranå clash in Draw 7 in an intriguing matchup as the two teams are in a points race to represent Sweden at the World Women's Curling Championship. Hasselborg's main focus right now is competing for the country at the Winter Olympics, though.
WEDNESDAY'S SCHEDULE/RESULTS
Draw 4: 9:30 a.m. ET / 8:30 a.m. CT
• Y. Schwaller 8, Casper 3: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Retornaz 5, Jacobs 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Hasselborg 6, X. Schwaller 5 (shootout): Watch Replay | Linescore
• Gim 12, Yoshimura 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
Draw 5: 1 p.m. ET / Noon CT
• Mouat 8, Edin 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Whyte 6, McEwen 3: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Peterson 5, Wranå 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Einarson 8, Tabata 7: Watch Replay | Linescore
Draw 6: 5 p.m. ET / 4 p.m. CT
• Shuster 7, Xu 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Waddell 9, Dunstone 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Fujisawa 5, Homan 4: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Tirinzoni 8, Kitazawa 5: Watch Replay | Linescore
Draw 7: 9 p.m. ET / 8 p.m. CT
• Yoshimura 7, Tabata 3: Watch Replay | Linescore
• Wranå 6, Hasselborg 5 (shootout): Watch Replay | Linescore
• Mouat 7, Casper 6 (shootout): Watch Replay | Linescore
• Retornaz 6, McEwen 2: Watch Replay | Linescore
ABOUT THE EVENT
The Crown Royal Players' Championship is the fifth and final Grand Slam of Curling event of the season, featuring 12 of the top men's teams and 12 of the top women's teams from around the world.
Both divisions are split into two pools of six for round-robin play. The top six teams overall advance to the playoffs, with the best two receiving byes to the semifinals. If necessary, one tiebreaker round will be played on Saturday.
If a game is tied after eight ends during the round-robin stage, a draw-to-the-button shootout will determine the winner. Teams receive three points for a regulation win, two points for a shootout win and one point for a shootout loss.
Extra ends will be played instead of shootouts during the tiebreakers and playoffs. The quarterfinals and semifinals are scheduled for Saturday, with both finals on tap Sunday.
