 Team Rachel Homan (Photo: Anil Mungal/GSOC) continue to dominate the women's GSOC Tour. By: Cameron Sallaj Rachel Homan and Emma Miskew continued to set records at the KIOTI GSOC Tahoe, defeating Team Silvana Tirinzoni 7-4 in the championship game to win their 20th Slam title. With third Tracy Fleury and lead Sarah Wilkes, Team Homan marched through the round robin in Lake Tahoe with an undefeated 4-0 record. This began with a 9-4 win over Japan's Team Ikue Kitazawa on Tuesday afternoon. From there, the team won two more games over Japanese rinks, topping Momoha Tabata and Sayaka Yoshimura of Sapporo 7-5 and 10-3 respectively. They also bounced Winnipeg's Kaitlyn Lawes 8-3 to take the top seed into the playoff round. In the quarterfinals, Team Homan matched up with the reigning world junior champions Team Kang from Korea, who they eliminated 7-2 to advance to the semifinals. There, they doubled up on Anna Hasselborg and her Swedish side 6-3, advancing to an eighth consecutive Slam final where they again would battle Switzerland's Silvana Tirinzoni. Despite starting without the hammer, Team Homan took a steal in the opening end after forcing Alina Patz to draw against five with her last stone of the end. Tirinzoni responded with a count of two in the second after Patz nailed a hit through a port. The next four ends saw strong defensive play, with both teams forcing each other to singles in ends three through six. This streak was snapped in the seventh, however, as Homan executed a perfect setup shot on her first which allowed her an open hit to score two. Heading to eight, the Canadian side led 5-4 with the Swiss holding the hammer. The eighth end was a masterclass by Homan, who took advantage of consecutive Tirinzoni misses to sit four in the top of the rings behind a center guard. Needing a wide draw to the side of the button to force a shootout, Patz stone wrecked on Homan's rock top four and did not find its way to scoring position. The Homan rink took two from the end, securing another title 7-4. Since forming prior to the 2022-23 season, Team Homan have played in fourteen of nineteen Slam finals. Of these fourteen finals, they have won nine of them, with six of those championships coming against the Tirinzoni rink. With their last loss to a Canadian team coming over a year ago, it will be difficult for any Canadian women's team to stop the Homan Empire at the Olympic Trials coming up in just over a week's time in Halifax. |
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Manitoba's Kate Cameron (Photo: Curling Canada) announced on Monday that the team will look different for the new Olympic quadrennial.
