HALIFAX — Christina Black, Jill Brothers, Marlee Powers and Karlee Everist finished shaking hands, and immediately, the Nova Scotia team ran toward one another on sheet B and jumped and hugged and screamed while a nearly full crowd cheered right along with them.
On Thursday afternoon on home ice, Halifax’s own Team Black upset Canada’s second-ranked Team Einarson at the Scotiabank Centre to earn a berth to this country’s best-of-three Olympic Trials final, against none other than World No. 1 Rachel Homan.
“Oh my goodness, this is unbelievable,” a grinning Black said after her team’s 6-3 win, pumping her shoulders up and down with excitement, minutes after she’d let fly her final shot, ending the game and celebrating by pumping her fist and pointing to the crowd with tears in her eyes.
What a win it was, sports fans. A chess match of guards, singles and forced draws until the ninth end, when the world No. 27 Team Black blew it open, led by their skipper, who curled a sparkling game-best 90 per cent.
“We just wanted to go out there and play a great game and keep it close, keep the crowd involved and just do our thing and stay calm, and we did that the whole day and stayed patient,” Black said, with a laugh. “So we won. This is great!”
They stayed patient indeed and waited until nine, capitalizing on some misses from Team Einarson. Third Val Sweeting missed a couple of takeouts, and Brothers floated in a draw on the button that put pressure on skipper Kerri Einarson.
“I played that really wide come around on the really frosty side of the ice, and the sweepers told me what to throw and I said, ‘What?’” Brothers said, when it was over. “So that’s what I threw and that’s where it went and, you know, they still had that run back — and that is their specialty. They are so good at runbacks. Val out-curls me every time I play her, so I expect her to make all those. So when we got a little lucky on a couple of those misses, and with me putting that one there and Tina [Christina] coming in with a good spot, it was what we needed.”
Einarson had a tough shot for three with her last, but only got rid of one Team Black stone, allowing Black to draw in her last for three and the 6-3 lead heading into the final end.
“It sucks,” Einarson said, after spending time with family, including her twin daughters, before leaving the ice. “You work so hard towards this, and this is something that you dream of doing. And it’s hard, but it just wasn’t meant to be, and unfortunately we got outplayed. We just missed a few shots here and there and didn’t capitalize on any opportunities we were given, and yeah, really unfortunate.”
A four-time Scotties champion, the 38-year-old Einarson has never cracked an Olympic Trials final.
Einarson, Sweeting and second Shannon Birchard have been playing together a long time, and lead Karlee Burgess was in tears after the game thinking about her teammates, how this was on their bucket list and on hers. “I really wanted to pull it out there for the girls today,” the 27-year-old Burgess said, apologizing several times for her tears, having to stop to catch her breath to get the words out.
“We felt really confident and felt like maybe it was our week and we just didn’t play our best today, and they had an unreal game.”
Team Black, bronze medallists at the Scotties earlier this year, is now two wins away from Milano Cortina 2026.
In the way is Team Homan, and Rachel Homan, Tracy Fleury, Emma Miskew and Sarah Wilkes were all watching the semifinal from ice level as it ended. Once it did and the celebrations were over, Team Homan went out to the ice and did squats and stretches ahead of their afternoon practice.
Team Black, meanwhile, was still celebrating and hugging off the ice.
“I think that might be the biggest win — probably,” the 38-year-old Black said, as far as her career goes. “I mean, in this grand scheme of things, just to finally win that big game against that team, because they’re so good. It’s a huge win.”
And it comes just two days after Nova Scotia lost a legend in Colleen Jones, whom Black idolized as she came up through the sport.
“Special,” Brothers said, in tears. “I’ve been curling for a really long time and four years ago, I said to my husband, ‘Should I keep playing? Should I keep chasing this dream?’”
He told her she should if that’s what she wanted, and she did. “So I tried a couple different things and then I found myself with Christina,” Brothers said. “We made it work really quick last year and we just really believe in each other.”
Just before she addressed media, Brothers had wrapped Black in a hug and told her, “I’m proud of you.” Twice.
This Trials semifinal marked Team Black’s first-ever win over Team Einarson. But it didn’t feel like an upset to the Nova Scotia squad that is ranked ninth in Canada, according to world curling rankings. “No,” Brothers said. “We know we can beat anyone.”
Asked how they’d beat the reigning world champions, Brothers laughed before she answered.
“You just go with confidence and you play amazing. That’s all you can do,” the third said. “They’re an incredible team. They’ve played on every surface you can imagine. So we just have to go out and play like we did today and probably better.”
Team Black is playing with house money on home ice in a best-of-three with an Olympic berth on the line, up against the No. 1 team in the world. A team from Nova Scotia has never represented Canada at the Olympics in curling.
“We’re just so excited we get to play more in front of this crowd — it’s so fun,” Black said, beaming. “We’re living the dream right now.”
