NIAGARA FALLS, Ont. — Rachel Homan and her Ottawa team picked up where they left off in the Grand Slam of Curling.
Homan, who wrapped up last season winning the Champions Cup, scored a 4-3 victory Tuesday morning over Vancouver’s Team Clancy Grandy during the opening draw of the HearingLife Tour Challenge at the Gale Centre.
It was a meeting between last season’s Tier 1 and Tier 2 women’s champions in the event. As Homan took the Tier 1 title in Grande Prairie, Alta., Grandy was victorious in Tier 2 to earn a promotion into the top group.
Homan jumped out to an early 3-0 lead by drawing for a deuce in the second end and stealing a point in the third. Grandy settled for a single in the fifth and stole back-to-back points in the sixth and seventh to level the scoreboard.
The 13-time Grand Slam champion Homan just needed to make an open hit with her last rock of the game to score the winning single.
Elsewhere, Team Kerri Einarson of Gimli took two points in the seventh end and topped Winnipeg’s Team Kate Cameron 5-3 in an all-Manitoba matchup.
Jennifer Jones scored a deuce in the eighth to lift her Winnipeg club to a 6-5 win over South Korea’s Team Seung-Youn Ha.
Sweden’s Team Anna Hasselborg doubled up on Italy’s Team Stefania Constantini 8-4.
TIER 2: DRAW 1 RESULTS
• Team Byeong-Jin Jeong 6, Team Michael Brunner 1
• Team Karsten Sturmay 6, Team Fredrik Nyman 4
• Team James Craik 6, Team Lukas Høstmælingen 4
• Team Sam Mooibroek 5, Team John Epping 4
UP NEXT
Draw 2 of the HearingLife Tour Challenge gets underway at 11:30 a.m. local time.
Broadcast coverage begins with Draw 10 Thursday at 11:30 a.m. ET / 8:30 a.m. PT on Sportsnet and Sportsnet+.
NOTES
The HearingLife Tour Challenge is the first Grand Slam of Curling event of the season with 32 men’s teams and 32 women’s teams in two tiers of action. Tier 1 features the top teams from around the world while Tier 2 features the next ranked group of teams looking to move up the ranks. … Round-robin play runs through to Friday with the top eight teams in each division qualifying for the playoffs. … The quarterfinals and semifinals are scheduled for Saturday with the finals set for Sunday.