Final Four at Olympic Mixed Doubles Curling Playoffs

The Monday evening semifinals are set for Olympic mixed doubles curling in Cortina.

Thanks to a thrilling 7-6 Italy victory over USA in the last round robin match on Monday morning, those same two teams – ranked second and third – will battle again at the 1956 Olympic Stadio olimpico del ghiaccio, renamed the Cortina Olympic Curling Stadium.

The other semifinal features top-ranked Great Britain against Sweden. Both teams enjoyed byes in this morning’s round robin finale.

When defending champions Italy compete – Cortina local Stefania Constantini and her towering partner Amos Mosaner – the arena throbs with an extra jolt of excitement and sound. The atmosphere is reminiscent of the Pinerolo Palaghiaccio, site of the curling competition at the 2006 Torino Olympic Winter Games.

In other matches, Canada defeated Switzerland 8-4, Norway beat Korea 8-5 and Czechia took out Estonia by an 8-4 count.

Great Britain finished 8-1, with Italy and USA at 6-3 and Sweden at 5-4.

Canada, Norway and Switzerland all finished 4-5, with Czechia and South Korea at 3-6 and Estonia at 2-7.

Of the lower-ranked teams, fans of Norway and Estonia will surely join Canada in sharing disappointment over their performances.

Canada has now missed the Olympic mixed doubles playoffs for two games in a row, following gold at the discipline’s debut in 2018.

Norway’s veteran crew won Olympic bronze that year and silver four years ago in Beijing. However, as noted by TCN’s Tomi Rantamäki, Norway’s Magnus Nedregotten has been coaching the Estonians while partner Kristin Skaslien focussed on qualifying Norway to Cortina in women’s fours.

Rantamaki also noted Estonia’s Marie Kalvee and Harri Lill were one of the most experienced mixed doubles teams coming into the Games, with strong access to international coaching expertise and sport science support.

The Czechs, with a total age of just 40 years between them, should be generally pleased with their results. Along with Korea, Julia Zelingrova and Vit Chabicovsky had to battle their way to Cortina through the challenging Olympic Qualifying Event in December of last year.