CurlingZone: Homan into Grand Slam Final

Ottawa's Rachel Homan (photo: Jeffrey Au) won 7-6 in an extra end over Korea's Eunjung Kim in Saturday's evening semifinals.

Homan, with Tracy Fleury at third, Emma Miskew, and Sarah Wilkes on the front end, improved to 39 and 2 on the season, stretching their winning streak to 22 games over the last three events.

Kim, with Kyeongae Kim at third, Chohi Kim and Seonyeong Kim on the front end, also entered the semifinals undefeated, winning the pre-game draw to the button for hammer advantage.

Kim got off to a quick start, scoring two points in the first end, with Homan keeping pace with two points of their own in the second end.

After Kim blanked the third end, they scored two points in the fourth end, then stole a point in the fifth end to lead 5-2 and looked to put Homan's streak at an end.

Not to be counted out, Homan scored two points in the sixth end to cut the deficit to a single point, then stole two points in the seventh end to take their first lead of the game.

Kim scored a single point in the eighth end to force an extra end, where Homan scored a single point for the win.

Homan is set to play Sweden's Anna Hasselborg in the Final of the KIOTI National, taking place Sunday at Mary Brown's Centre in St. John's. Newfoundland and Labrador.

The final goes at 12:30pm Newfoundland Time (NT), 11am Eastern Time (ET).

In the other semifinal matchup, Hasselborg defeated Gimli's Kerri Einarson 7-1.

In the quarterfinals, Hasselborg (Sundbyberg) defeated Christina Black (Halifax) 7-6 in an extra end, while Einarson defeated Satsuki Fujisawa (Kitami, Japan) 12-3, Kim (Gangneung) defeated Seungyoun Ha (Chuncheon, South Korea) 6-3 and Homan defeated Sayaka Yoshimura (Sapporo, Japan) 7-6 in an extra end.

Homan finished 4-0 in the 16-team round-robin pools qualifying round. In their opening game, Homan defeated Chelsea Carey (Winnipeg) 8-3, then won 6-3 against Black and 7-3 against Stefania Constantini (Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy). Homan won 11-6 against Isabella Wrana (Sundbyberg, Sweden) in their final qualifying round match.

Homan has a career record of 38 wins and 14 losses in 9 appearances at the KIOTI National, winning in 2018, and 2015.

After winning the semifinals, Homan joined Chris Plys and Colin Hufman on Saturday evening, helping win the GSOK (Karaoke) belt title.

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