SAULT STE. MARIE, Ont. -- Her 24-hour funk was over Thursday morning.
Ontario skip Krista McCarville left the Essar Centre looking dazed and confused after losing two straight games on Wednesday, but she looked like a new woman when her crew clipped Nova Scotia's Nancy McConnery 7-3 in a Scotties Tournament of Hearts contest a day later.
"That was much better," said a somewhat relieved McCarville. "Definitely, our team was back and I felt like I was back. I felt like I had more confidence than I did (Wednesday) so, it feels really good to get our whole team back there and just forget about (Wednesday), and I think we did a really good job of doing that."
But the Ontario squad did do a lot of soul-searching that night.
"We just weren't catching on to the ice and we didn't have that confidence," McCarville said. "Going into that second game, I think we were just rattled from that first game loss and didn't fully get over it. So we had a good talk and a good night off to think about what we really need to do today and we came out a lot better."
She also had a long tete-a-tete with coach Rick Lang, a Brier legend.
"We talked about some good things and about some bad things and what I needed to do," McCarville revealed. "I needed to be that skip, that leader and I think I was a lot better ... in leading my team."
McCarville had a similar sit-down with Lang during the pre-trials in Prince George, B.C. that resulted her best season to date.
The win over Nova Scotia clinched at least a tie-breaker for Ontario.
"It was absolutely huge to win that one," said McCarville, who improved to 7-3 before facing Team Canada's Jennifer Jones (also 7-3) last night.
FEMALE RUSS?: Russ Howard proved the lineup could work when he helped Newfoundland's Brad Gushue win Olympic Gold in 2006. Howard called the game and threw second stone, just like Kathy O'Rourke is doing for P.E.I.'s Erin Carmody here this week.
So, should fans be calling her Russ now?
"You know, I'd love to be Russ," O'Rourke responded. "He certainly showed what experience could do."
LEADING WAY: Team Canada's Dawn Askin has led the leads in percentage all week and went into last night's match shooting 88%, six more than the leads who sit tied for second (Saskatchewan's Heather Kalenchuk and B.C.'s Jacquie Armstrong).
"Yeah, I've felt really good all week with draw weight," she said.
