Rachel Homan rink playoff-bound at worlds, Canada guaranteed Olympic berth
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It was a double-dose of pride for Rachel Homan and her Canadian crew Thursday at the 2025 LGT World Women’s Curling Championship.
Their two-win day makes them playoff-bound at the global gala — in defence of their title — in Uijeongbu, South Korea.
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And the winning effort also assured Canada a spot in the women’s curling competition at the 2026 Olympic Winter Games.
“I feel pretty proud that we’re able to represent Canada and get enough points to get to an Olympic spot,” said a delighted Homan. “I’m just proud that we’re able to clinch that spot for Canada.”
While World Curling won’t official announce Olympic berths until all the teams are determined for the 10-country field of the 2026 Milano Cortina Olympics, the Canadians knew a high placing at these worlds would give our country the right to go for Games glory next winter.
And although Homan and her rink from the Ottawa Curling Club are currently ranked No. 1 on the planet among women’s teams and looking strong in pushing for a second straight world crown this weekend at Uijeongbu Indoor Ice Rink, it’s not guaranteed that they will be the ones representing Canada at the Olympics.
The 2025 Canadian Curling Trials are set to decide that Nov. 22-30 in Halifax.
WHICH OTHERS ARE IN FOR THE OLYMPICS?
Seven nations earning berths from the worlds to join host Italy for the 2026 Games are determined by combining the Olympic qualification points earned from both this year’s and last year’s worlds.
And those points are garnered by a country’s placing in each year’s standings at the worlds.
After the 2024 worlds, here is the scoreboard:
• Canada, 15 points
• Switzerland, 13
• Korea, 11
• Italy, 10
• Sweden, 9
• Denmark, 8
• USA, 7
• Great Britain (Scotland), 7
• Norway, 5
• Türkiye, 4
• Japan, 3
• Estonia, 2 (not participating in 2025 worlds)
• New Zealand, 1 (not participating in 2025 worlds)
Because of the current 8-2 record for Homan, Canada can’t finish any lower than sixth in these worlds, so they are already locked in to collect at least eight points for the Olympic qualification process, giving them at least a combined 23 over the two world championships and a spot at the 2026 Milano Cortina Games.
Switzerland, Korea and Sweden are also locked into Olympic berths.
The rest have yet to be determined, with China (6-4) — in particular — needing a strong finish in Uijeongbu after not participating in the 2024 worlds.
The final two teams to qualify for the Olympics will be determined at a last-chance bonspiel in Kelowna, B.C., from Dec. 6-13, 2025.
HOW DOES THE PLAYOFF PICTURE LOOK?
It was, indeed, a banner day for Canada on the penultimate day of the worlds round robin Thursday.
Skip Homan, vice-skip Tracy Fleury, second Emma Miskew, lead Sarah Wilkes, alternate Rachelle Brown and national coaches Viktor Kjell and Renée Sonnenberg took down undefeated Switzerland’s Silvana Tirinzoni (9-1) early in a 7-6 heavyweight bout and then put up an 11-2 win over Japan’s Team Sayaka Yoshimura (3-7).
With only two games left on tap for the Canadians — they play Italy’s Stefania Constantini (4-6) (1 a.m. ET, TSN) and China’s Rui Wang (6 a.m. ET, TSN) on Friday — they have guaranteed themselves a spot in weekend playoff action at the worlds.
But the push is on to finish first or second and earn a coveted bye directly to Saturday’s afternoon semifinals.
Only the Swiss boasted a better record than Canada heading into Friday’s action.
Those teams that conclude the round robin with the third-, fourth-, fifth- and sixth-best records play off in the qualifying round, during which the losers of 3-v-6 and 4-v-5 teams are eliminated.
Smartly, however, Miskew says the rink is focused on what it can control, knowing that other factors beyond her team’s control could still impact its standing.
“We can’t control anything else and how that plays out,” Miskew said.
“All we can control is our next two games for now, so we’ll try to go out and be sharp. If we can win our two games and if it works out that way, then great. If we have to play in the qualifier, then that’s fine, too.”
With Switzerland on nine wins and South Korea’s Eunji Gim and Sweden’s Anna Hasselborg matching Canada’s eight-win record heading into Friday, it is a dogfight for those top-two spots.
But Canada holds the tiebreaker based on its last-stone draw in a possible three-way tie with Sweden and South Korea.
EXTRA ENDS
Sweden had another two-win day Thursday at worlds to keep them even with Canada in the standings after respective 7-5 and 8-4 decisions over Korea and China. China did get an important 9-5 win over Denmark (5-5) to put it closer to playoff qualification. As did Scotland (6-4), with a 10-6 defeat of Türkiye (1-9) … Other games Thursday saw: Korea 10-4 over Lithuania (0-11); Norway (5-6) 6-3 over USA (3-7); Italy 9-2 over Norway; Switzerland 9-8 over Lithuania; Turkey 4-3 over Japan; and Denmark 10-9 over USA … Four teams from the 32-team field were left standing after Thursday’s playoff action of the 2025 Canadian Mixed Doubles Curling Championship in Summerside, P.E.I. They are Melissa Adams/Alex Robichaud (6-3), Marlee Powers/Luke Saunders (7-2), Kira Brunton/Jacob Horgan (8-0) and defending champions Kadriana Lott/Colton Lott (8-1). The day’s early playoff games saw: Emily Riley/Jesse Mullen (6-2) defeat Amanda Sluchinski/Aaron Sluchinski (5-3) 7-6; Adams/Robichaud defeat Katie Ford/Oliver Campbell (6-2) 11-4; Powers/Saunders stun Olympic trials champs Jocelyn Peterman/Brett Gallant (5-3); and defending champions Kadriana Lott/Colton Lott (7-1) upend Paige Papley/Evan Van Amsterdam (4-4) 10-4. What followed later Thursday were quarterfinals, which saw: Lott/Lott 9-4 defeat Nancy Martin/Steve Laycock (5-2); Powers/Saunders 6-4 upset Laura Walker/Kirk Muyres (7-1); Brunton/Horgan 8-2 drop Riley/Mullen; and Adams/Robichaud 9-8 shock curling legends Jennifer Jones/Brett Laing (6-1) … The action continues with championship day Friday, with the semifinals (8:30 a.m. ET) — Lott/Lott v. Brunton/Horgan and Powers/Saunders v. Adams/Robichaud — and gold-medal final (noon ET). Select games are live-streamed on Curling Canada’s YouTube channel.
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