Quarterfinal Finish – Our First Grand Slam as a Team
Our first Grand Slam as a team is already in the books! The first Grand Slam of the season took place in Victoria, Canada. After travelling from Calgary, we settled into our accommodation for the week. That same evening, we had our official practice session at the Save-On-Foods Memorial Arena. The ice conditions were excellent, and we were excited to compete in our first Grand Slam together.
In our opening game, we faced the Canadian home team Reese-Hansen. Our opponents delivered a very strong performance, while we made too many mistakes. As a result, we had to accept a loss in our first game. The focus was now on learning from the defeat and gathering as much valuable information as possible about the rocks and ice conditions.
On the second day, we played against the Italian team Zardini Lacedelli. With a significant improvement in our performance, we managed to win the game and celebrate our first victory. In our third game, we faced the Swiss team Schwaller for the fifth time this season. A tactical mistake in the third end, along with several smaller inaccuracies, cost us important points, and we had to accept another defeat.
After a detailed analysis and some much-needed recovery, we felt ready for our fourth and final round-robin game. Against the Korean team Kang, we delivered a very solid performance and also took advantage of our opponents' mistakes. With this victory, we finished the round robin with an even record of two wins and two losses.
This qualified us for the tiebreaker on Saturday morning, where we once again faced the Italian team Zardini Lacedelli. It turned into an exciting and closely contested game at a high level, which we ultimately managed to win. With that victory, we secured our spot in the quarterfinals!
There was hardly any time to catch our breath, as the quarterfinal followed immediately afterwards. Once again, our opponents were Team Schwaller, whom we were facing for the sixth time this season.
