PERTH — Trish Paulsen is off to the women’s final at the world junior curling championship.
The Saskatoon skip advanced to the championship by upsetting Russian Anna Sidorova 9-7 in semifinal action after earlier downing Sweden’s Jonna McManus 9-6 in the Page 3 versus 4 playoff game.
Paulsen will face Scotland’s Eve Muirhead in the final Sunday looking to secure Canada’s first junior women’s curling championship since 2003. Muirhead advanced to the gold medal game with a 7-6 extra end win over Russia in the Page 1 versus 2 playoff.
Paulsen had to rally for her fifth straight victory. After giving up two in the first end against Russia, she scored three in the second, fourth and eighth ends for a 9-5 lead.
“I missed a key draw for four in the second which kind of took the wind out of my sails for a little bit,” Paulsen said. “But after that we just kept rolling and, yes, the threes do tell the story, we played really well.
“I think the girls put pressure on the front end for the whole game, and the back end as well. Russia played great, but they just missed a few key shots and we capitalized on that.”
Muirhead led Scotland to it’s third consecutive world junior women’s curling championship last year, downing Canada’s Kaitlyn Lawes 8-6 at Vancouver’s Olympic Centre. Muirhead also skipped the 2008 squad and played third on the 2007 foursome.
But Paulsen handed Muirhead one of just two losses during the round-robin and is expecting another tough contest.
Regina’s Braeden Moskowy wasn’t so fortunate, losing a 6-5 semifinal decision to Switzerland on fourth Benoit Schwarz’s draw to the button on the final rock. Moskowy’s foursome will face Norway in the bronze medal game.
“Close,” he lamented afterwards. “We took the defending world champions right down to the last shot and we made them draw the pin, so kudos to them.”