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Canada made wheelchair curling history on Thursday as the first team at any Paralympics to complete round-robin play without a loss.
Skip Mark Ideson, second Ina Forrest, third Jon Thurston, lead Collinda Joseph and alternate Gil Dash raised their record to 9-0 in Milan Cortina with a 7-3 win over the United States, a few hours after beating South Korea 6-3.
Resiliency and believe in each other, Thurston told reporters, has been the key to Canada’s success.
“We’ve trained a lot together,” he said. “We know what everybody’s capable of and we’ve stayed calm in the moments where we’ve had pressure on us. We’ve done really well at producing points when we needed them.
“A couple of tight games that came down to the eighth end, but we were able to produce the points we needed to get the win or an extra end.”
The Canadians clinched the top playoff seed against the South Koreans (5-4), who they face in Friday’s semifinal at 5:05 a.m. ET.
Two-time defending champions China (8-1) and Sweden (5-4) will battle in the other semifinal.
China’s lone loss came at the hands of Canada on Tuesday. The Canadians earned a playoff spot later that day by defeating 2022 silver medallists Sweden to move to 6-0.
Canada, ranked second in the world behind China, has reached the wheelchair curling podium at every Paralympics since the sport’s addition in 2006. It won the first three gold medals and took bronze at the last two editions.
After becoming the first rink to sweep mixed wheelchair curling round-robin play at the Paralympics, Canadian skip Mark Ideson praises the entire team for their effort and says they’re ready for the medal rounds.
Up 4-3 after five ends against the U.S., Canada stole two points in the sixth and another in the seventh.
The Americans struck first, taking a 2-0 lead in the first end. The Canadians drew even in the second before the teams exchanged points in the following two ends.
Canada defeats the United States 7-3 in mixed team wheelchair curling at the Milano-Cortina Paralympic Games. The Canadians, who had already secured the top playoff seed, make Paralympic history by becoming the first rink to go undefeated in round-robin play (9-0) and will take on South Korea in the semifinals on Friday.
Against South Korea, Canada jumped out to a 4-1 edge after four ends, led by Ideson, but it was a one-point game after the sixth.
Thurston described Ideson as a “great leader” with his calm demeanour.
“I can’t say enough about him,” said Thurston.
Canada scored a point in each of the final two ends to secure the win at Cortina Curling Olympic Stadium.
Thurston delivered a clutch, game-saving draw in the final end to neutralize a three-stone threat.
Canada’s wheelchair curling rink beat South Korea 6-3, and locked up the top spot in the Milano-Cortina Paralympic round robin by improving their record to 8-0, with one draw remaining against the United States.
Gosselin earns 4th top-10 finish
Earlier Thursday, Canada’s Michaela Gosselin skied to her fourth top-10 finish in as many events at Milano Cortina, placing eighth in the standing giant slalom.
The Collingwood, Ont., native clocked a total time of two minutes 38.08 seconds across her two runs at Tofane Alpine Skiing Centre in Cortina d’Ampezzo.
Sweden’s Ebba Aarsjoe (2:22.42) captured her third gold of Milano Cortina. Russia’s Varvara Voronchikhina earned silver in 2:25.26 and France’s Aurélie Richard took bronze in 2:27.04.
Florence Carrier, of Magog, Que., placed 13th in the event while making her Paralympic debut. The 18-year-old is Canada’s youngest athlete at these Games.
Gosselin and Carrier still have the slalom to come on Saturday.
The 25-year-old Gosselin finished fifth in the downhill, ninth in the super-G and seventh in the alpine combined.
Canada has 10 medals through six days of competition in Italy — one gold, three silver, six bronze. The full medal table is available here.
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