By Jonathan Brazeau
MEDICINE HAT, Alta. — Edmonton's Team Selena Sturmay emerged victorious over Team Anna Hasselborg in a must-win matchup Friday afternoon at the P&H Masters.
Sturmay (3-1, eight points) held on for a 7-6 victory and qualified for the playoffs for the first time in the Grand Slam of Curling presented by Molson Canadian.
"That feels great," said Danielle Schmiemann, who throws third stones on Team Sturmay. "We knew we needed some points out of that game, for sure. How many we weren't exactly sure, so we tried our best to get the full three. Happy going into the quarterfinals."
Team Sturmay received an invite to the Grand Slam tournament after winning the Autumn Gold Curling Classic satellite qualifying event last month just outside of Calgary in Okotoks, Alberta.
Schmiemann said it's nice to advance to the playoffs on home-province ice.
"We were really lucky to be here this week. We had a good week in Calgary to get us into this event, so we feel like we really earned our spot this week," she said. "We just wanted to show that we can fit in here, we belong here and it wasn't just kind of a one-off sort of thing, so I'm very happy with that."
Sturmay secured the hammer to start the match. That proved key, as Sturmay never trailed and Hasselborg needed to keep pace throughout. After Sturmay scored a deuce in the seventh to take a 7-5 lead, Hasselborg held the hammer coming home and looked to count three for the outright win.
Hasselborg's bump shot scored only a single, as the two-time Olympic gold medallist was eliminated at 2-2 (four points).
Switzerland's Team Alina Pätz also advanced to the playoffs after completing an 8-6 comeback victory over Japan's Team Ikue Kitazawa.
Pätz qualified with a 2-2 record and seven points.
"It felt great, especially after those two last games," Pätz said. "It was a hell of a ride. Emotions up and down, but yeah, happy we could qualify for this game."
Pätz led until the fifth end when her last rock flashed, giving Kitazawa an open draw to score four points and jump ahead 6-4.
Although Pätz was held to a single in the sixth, she stole two in the seventh to retake the lead and swiped one more point in the eighth.
"I think we started really good into the game and then we just had some bad shots," Pätz said. "We said to ourselves we just need to play how we played at the start of the game, and we did that at the end."
It was the first loss of the week for Kitazawa (3-1), whose team had already clinched a playoff berth with nine points.
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Earlier Friday morning, Team Eun-ji Gim (3-1, 10 points) moved into the No. 1 spot with an 8-7 win over Team You-been Park in a clash between South Korean clubs.
Gim scored two in the fifth and stole three in the sixth to lead 8-4 when Park accidentally took out her own stone.
Park missed the playoffs at 1-3 (two points).
Sweden's Team Isabella Wranå (2-1, seven points) also qualified for the playoffs with a game in hand.
Switzerland's Team Xenia Schwaller (2-1, six points), Canada's Team Rachel Homan (2-1, six points), Canada's Team Taylor Reese-Hansen (2-1, points), Japan's Team Miku Nihira (2-2, six points) and Japan's Team Satsuki Fujisawa (2-2, six points) are in the mix for the final three spots.
Fujisawa downed Canada's Team Grace Lloyd 8-1 and Nihira trounced Japan's Team Mina Kobayashi by an identical score in the morning draw.
Teams receive three points for a regulation win (in eight ends or fewer), two points for a shootout win, one point for a shootout loss with the hammer, and zero points for a shootout loss without the hammer or a regulation loss.
