Olympic curling takeaways: Homan’s win streak sets up a do-or-die game

Did you want more curling chaos at the 2026 Winter Olympics? Well, you got it.

After Canada’s Team Rachel Homan started the Games 1-3, they’ve now rattled off four straight wins, including a thrilling 8-7 extra end victory over Italy’s Stefania Constantini on Thursday to improve her record to 5-3 and keep her playoff hopes alive.

It sets up a win-and-you’re-in game for the Canadian rink from Ottawa when they take on Korea’s Team led by skip Gim Eun-ji Thursday at 8:05 a.m. ET/ 5:05 a.m. PT. 

If Canada loses, they won’t make the playoffs. None of the other results matter.

Homan’s second and lifelong teammate, Emma Miskew, breathed a sigh of relief after the near collapse against the Italians, knowing what was at stake. 

“We’re just happy to still be in a position that we can control our own destiny,” Miskew told CBC Olympics after the game. 

“We’re just trying to stick with one shot at a time again and not really think ahead too much. We know that we can manage to win tough games that aren’t always looking as good at the start and we’re just going to keep with that.”

The Canadians let three-point leads slip away at multiple points in the game.

The contest even appeared to be on ice after Homan’s beautiful draw in the ninth end scored two and gave Canada a 7-4 lead. But a terrible 10th end by Homan and her team let Constantini score three right back and send the game to an extra end.

The Canadians were outcurled 77 per cent to 75 per cent by the Italians. 

The game wasn’t pretty for Homan’s team made up of Tracy Fleury, Miskew and Sarah Wilkes, but neither has the whole week. Somehow, some way, they’ve managed to earn the only stat that matters with their backs against the wall. Wins.

In order for the Canadian rink to achieve their dream of winning a gold medal, they will have to win seven in a row.

Jacobs’ leadership continues to shine at these Games

The Italian fans must hate the Canadian curlers even more after Wednesday.

Before seeing Constantini (who was already eliminated from the playoffs) lose to Homan the Olympic host crowd had to watch Canada’s Team Brad Jacobs rip apart their men’s team Joel Retornaz, who desperately needed to win to boost his playoff odds. 

For the Canadians it was probably their worst start of the week, as they trailed 3-0 after three ends.

Second Brett Gallant, who competed in the mixed doubles curling discipline at these Olympics as well, knew it.

“I don’t think it was our best game of the week, but our back end made a couple of really big shots and got a couple breaks,” Gallant told CBC Olympics.

One of those breaks came in the fifth end when Retornaz flashed a wide-open hit while attempting to blank to tie the game at 3-3.

The Italian coach Ryan Fry, who won gold with Jacobs at the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia, tried to reset his skipper’s mindset.

“We can’t do anything about that last shot. Reset right now,” Fry said during the fifth-end break.

However, Retornaz and his team self-destructed. They gave up a steal of four in the sixth end and another steal in the seventh before shaking.

Gallant felt the momentum change after the flash.

“That was a big shot, we kind of went from just chasing a little bit and then that just evened it up,” said Gallant. “Played a couple of good ends after that and, yeah, definitely that was probably the turning point.”

Back when it was 3-0 for Italy it could have been easy for Jacobs and his teammates to let the game slip away considering they had already locked up a playoff spot. Jacobs didn’t let that happen though and showed the great leadership skills he learned in 2014 to get his team right back into the fight.

For Gallant and the team, they fed off of it.

“(He’s) Best leader in curling I believe, he’s just fearless, he leads by example, he’s got our back,” Gallant said. “And you know he’d run through a wall for us, and we feel that and (it) makes you want to play really well for him.”

Even though the team has been outstanding the whole week, and Jacobs in particular has looked like a man on a mission, he doesn’t think they’ve done squat yet.

“We haven’t accomplished anything yet, the jobs not done, not even close, not by a mile,” Jacobs told CBC Olympics. 

The last time we saw Jacobs this dialled in, he ended up with a gold medal, the last gold medal Canada has won in the men’s curling discipline.

Playoff race is pure madness

After eight games have been played for most teams on both the men’s and women’s side there are still somehow eight teams in the mix to make the four-team playoffs.

Obviously, we know, it’s win-and-you’re-in, or, lose-and-you’re-out for Homan but there are many other possibilities.

For the women, if the U.S. and Canada win, they make the playoffs. If the Americans and Korea win, they clinch.

But if Canada and the U.S. lose, Great Britain is able to get in – along with Korea – if they win their game against Italy.

Now here’s where it gets interesting. If Korea and the Americans are to lose and the Brits win, then Canada and potentially Great Britain will reach the playoffs.

The Brits would have to have beat Korea in the Draw Shot Challenge (which they currently are) in order to advance. 

On the men’s side it’s even more of a mess.

There are four teams also gunning for two spots, including world No. 1 ranked Bruce Mouat who will be idle tomorrow after finishing 5-4 overall. 

Don’t take your eyes off the screen and refresh the score pages every five seconds. 

Thursday is the last day of round-robin play at the Olympics for curling. It starts at 3:05 a.m. ET/ 12:05 a.m. PT when Jacobs will face off against Norway (CBC Gem, Sportsnet+). 

The men’s semifinals will take place tomorrow at 1:05 p.m. ET/ 10:05 a.m. PT. Switzerland’s Yannick Schwaller finished as the one seed and will face whoever finishes fourth while Jacobs will take on the third-place finisher in the 10-team round-robin.