Wednesday, April 05, 2006

WMC: Day Five Recap

This is going to be a shorter than usual update, cause I'm doing it late, and I'm doing it barely awake.

Not as good of a day for my big four teams today. After going 8-0 yesterday, they combined for just 5-3 today, even though the big Scotland/Finland match made another perfect day impossible.

Scotland went perfect today, notching up a victory against the team from Denmark in rather convincing fashion before winning the showdown against U15, a match that came down to the last end, with Scotland pulling off three points to break what had been a 6-6 tie.

That was Finland's only loss in their two matches. In their other draw of action, they dismantled the Denmark team 12-3. Actually, the entire first draw was blowouts, with the winners outscoring the losers a combined 39-7.

The United States was on the good side of one of those blowouts, holding the Germans to just one point while scoring seven of their own, including a four point end. However, they slipped up against the pesky Australian team, which looks like it wants to prove me wrong about them overperforming early. The Aussies turned a 4-2 defecit after 8 ends into a 5-4 victory by taking the last two against Fenson's Team USA.

That just leaves Canada, who beat the Japanese 7-4 before falling to Switzerland 10-9 in a match that saw the team from up north have to pull off 3 in the ninth end just to take a tie into the tenth. The Swiss team used the hammer like it's meant to be used, and scored the necessary point.

So. Standings. The Scots have caught the Americans. The upper bar has stayed the same. The lower bar has moved, though, with now 4 teams in contention for what would be the last spot instead of just two.

Standings
Scotland 7-2
United States 7-2
Canada 6-3
--------------------
Finland 5-4
Norway 5-4
Switzerland 5-4
Sweden 5-4
--------------------
Australia 4-5
Germany 4-5
Denmark 3-6
Japan 2-7
Ireland 1-8

Tomorrow is the last day of draws. 8 is the magic number to advance without going through a tiebreaker. 7 will get you at least a tiebreaker. 6 and you need help. That means that the US and Scotland will at least advance from the Round Robin. US/Canada will finally tussle in the last draw tomorrow. Scotland's being handed their 8th win with a match against the Irish team in that same draw. Finland's got two games against teams above the top line. Norway's playing two below the second line. Switzerland's playing the top and bottom teams. Sweden's drawing against two below the second line.

It's going to be a big day of curling!

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