A well-played close final Sunday afternoon in Morden capped off the Scotties Tournament of Hearts with the top seeded team skipped by Kaitlyn Lawes edging the Beth Peterson foursome 9-8.
It was a close game the whole way between Lawes, who finished 5-0 in the round robin, and Peterson, who went 3-2 and whose team included Morden native Katherine Doerksen.
The key shot in the end was a Lawes deuce in the ninth when she faced two and played a re-direct hit, just rubbing off a Peterson stone in the front of the eight foot circle and doubling out the second stone on the centre line in the back of the eight foot circle.
Team Lawes jumped out to a 4-1 lead after three ends, but Peterson and her team fought back to tie it up 7-7 after eight.
The Lawes deuce in the ninth end set the stage for a dramatic tenth when Peterson had a chance to draw through a narrow port to the four foot circle for a pair and a tie. She navigated the port but slid a few inches too deep and scored just a single.
“When I let it go, I thought it was close, and it’s either a flash or a two, so we went for it, and I thought it was kind of a gutsy call,” Lawes said of her critical deuce.
“There were some great shots made on both sides and just some great line calls and well swept,” she said, noting as well a key shot in the seventh when she called for a little nudge to prevent a steal.
“It was very intense. Beth and her team played phenomenal, like first end runback after runback, and we knew we had to bring our A game and had to hang in there and make some big shots.”
A teary Peterson afterwards lamented coming up just short at the end of a challenging week which saw her and a teammate both make visits to the walk-in clinic with injuries and needing to have their fifth step in as well.
“I’m so proud of the girls … people don’t even know how much adversity we had this week,” she said. “It was a really long week with a lot of challenges thrown our way, and I just thought we had this last one … I’m pretty devastated.”
Despite the challenges, the Peterson team qualified for the championship round with a 3-2 round robin record amd then were the only team to win all three championship round games and played a precision control game to win the semi-final over third seeded Kate Cameron.
She was optimistic heading into the championship final.
“Honestly, the girls did such a good job of keeping us in that game. It was a tough game, and we were down a lot, but a lot of good shots made, so I’m really proud of this team,” said Peterson, who called it a hard loss that was going to sting for awhile. “Kaitlyn made some really key shots … you can never count her out, and she made a great shot.”
Lawes was equally proud of her new Fort Rouge team that includes Selena Njegovan, Jocelyn Peterman, and Kristin McCuish.
“It’s our first provincial win as a team, and I’m so proud of the girls for hanging in there right to the end,” she said.
Lawes sees winning the provincial championship as really helping build their team confidence now going as Team Manitoba to the national Scotties Tournament of Hearts later this month alongside fellow Manitoba teams led by Kerri Einarson and Jennifer Jones.
“Any chance you get to play in big finals, we keep saying the more finals we can get into the better, and it’s really exciting going into the Scotties being Team Manitoba,” said Lawes, who concluded with encouraging words for the Peterson team. “They had a phenomenal week, and look out—they’re a great team, and they’ll be right there for the next few years.”
