Morris, Griffith forced to change partners for Olympic mixed doubles trials
Some of Canada’s biggest curling names had to quickly find another big name to get a second chance at wearing the Maple Leaf at the 2018 Olympic Games.
When Rachel Homan and Kevin Koe won the Tim Hortons Roar of the Rings in Ottawa on Sunday and punched their ticket to South Korea, it meant a partner swap on some teams bound for the Olympic mixed doubles curling trials on Jan. 2-7.
Mixed doubles — with teams comprised of a male and a female curler — will make its Olympic debut in Pyeongchang.
The 18-team Canad Inns Mixed Doubles Curling Trials in Portage La Prairie, Man., will determine Canada’s first representative in Olympic mixed doubles.
Curling Canada decided it wasn’t good for the country’s medal chances in mixed doubles and full team competition to have the country’s top curlers compete in both in Pyeongchang.
So the Homan and Koe victories took players from those teams out of the mix for mixed doubles and impacted five teams.
The five had until Thursday to name a replacement partner.
The following are the changes to the five impacted teams with previous partner in brackets:
— Jennifer Jones (Brent Laing) Mark Nichols.
— John Morris, who had been skipping a Vernon-Kelowna rink with Jim Cotter (Rachel Homan) Kaitlyn Lawes.
— Tyrel Griffith of Kelowna (Emma Miskew) Sherry Just.
— Reid Carruthers (Joanne Courtney) Jill Officer. — John Epping (Lisa Weagle) Sherry Middaugh.
“I think all the matchups are good for all the players for all different reasons,” said Jeff Stoughton, Curling Canada mixed doubles program manager. “A lot of these teams coming from the trials have played a lot of games and are game-ready.”
Morris and Homan were the topranked team in mixed doubles.