Curling Canada sweeps aside Olympic concerns

There were moments in the aftermath of Canada’s stunning fall in men’s and women’s curling at the 2018 Olympics when the hand-wringers of the nation began calling for significant changes to the qualifying process.

The thinking went that something needed to be done to better prepare the Canadian teams for the massive stage that is the Olympics after Rachel Homan of Ottawa and Kevin Koe of Calgary finished off the podium in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

It was the first time any Canadian teams had failed to earn a medal at the Olympics and it was certainly a concern.

In the end, cooler heads prevailed and you’d have to think Curling Canada’s decision to stay the course was the right one, given that Canada has won eight international medals since the Olympics ended.

“There was certainly panic in the streets from the curling public, but Curling Canada and Own The Podium and the Canadian Olympic association understand that things do happen,” said Jeff Stoughton, the men’s national team coach and head of the Canadian mixed doubles program.

“We didn’t feel that there was a need to make dramatic changes because of the results at the Olympics.

“I think we can all look at it as a blip. You look historically over the last four or five years and Canada has been on the podium, if not winning the gold medal, in every world championship out there. The Olympics were just a blip. It just happened.”

Since the Olympics ended with only one medal in three disciplines for Canada — John Morris and Kaitlyn Lawes took gold in mixed doubles — Canada claimed five medals at world championships and three more at the inaugural World Cup event in China last weekend.

Jennifer Jones won the world women’s championship, Tyler Tardi and Kaitlyn Jones won the world junior crowns, Brad Gushue took silver at the men’s worlds and Laura Walker and Kirk Muyres earned bronze at the mixed doubles worlds.

Then Homan and Koe both earned gold medals at the World Cup, as did Walker and Muyres.

“For Rachel’s team and Kevin and (lead) Ben (Hebert), it would never make up for the Olympics, but this was the first chance they had since the Olympics to put on a maple leaf and compete for their country, so they wanted to show that all is well,” said Nolan Thiessen, Curling Canada’s manager of championship services and athlete liaison.

“I was over there with the teams and they had it ratcheted up a little more than usual because they were wearing the maple leaf. It was a big deal for them to go out there and win.”

Curling Canada did take some time to look at concerns raised by the teams that were in South Korea and some tweaks will be made to the qualifying process, including the Olympic trials in 2021.

For the most part, though, they came to the conclusion that Canada is in fine shape and the rest of the world is getting pretty good at curling, too.

“We sent good teams over there, but sports happened,” Thiessen said. “You can’t predict anything.

“It’s one of those deals where we could change absolutely everything about the trials process and still not medal and we could change nothing about the process and go triple gold.”

One idea floated at the Olympics was moving the Canadian trials to the season before the Olympics in order to give the teams more time to prepare.

Stoughton said the trials will likely be moved up a week or two, but not to the previous year.

“We didn’t feel like anything was really substantially broken, so why change the process now?” Stoughton said. “A week or two may help a little bit, but it certainly isn’t in need of a drastic change.”

Those eight international medals would suggest he’s absolutely right.

CHRIS GRAYTHEN / GETTY IMAGES Since Rachel Homan’s medal-less performance with her team at the Winter Games, Canada has won eight medals on the international stage, prompting Curling Canada to avoid “dramatic changes” to the Olympic qualifying process.