Scotland raised their game to a new level as they gained revenge for their opening day loss to Korea to force their way into the semi-finals at the World Wheelchair Championships in Canada.
They will now face the host nation looking to again overturn the outcome of their meeting in the round-robin stages to earn a shot at winning gold with belief surging through the team after they delivered the performance requested of them by coach Sheila Swan, to beat Korea 6-2 in the first round of the play-offs.
“We are all delighted after a very nice evening together,” said the team’s lead Jo Butterfield, basking in the satisfaction of the performance. 
“We knew going into this game that the start was crucial, which Sheila reiterated to us, telling us that if we could get out of the blocks we would have a good chance and we did that.
“We had our best game and we saved it for the right time and that’s what we need to do again now.”
The Scots had required help from elsewhere to be among the six teams to reach the play-offs after suffering a loss in their final round-robin match which left them on a record of five wins and six losses.
However, they were determined to seize the opportunity that presented itself and after a tight first half, which saw singles exchanged at each of the first four ends, they seized the initiative by stealing against the hammer at three successive ends, taking two at the seventh to move 6-2 ahead before running their opponents out of stones at the last.
“Coming into this game the record of wins and losses was back to zero,” said Butterfield.
“It was a fresh start and was now about winning each game as it came and that’s job done today and we go again the same tomorrow.
“We were probably not expected to get this far, with a new squad, in particular the inexperience of myself and little game time together, but I’m really proud of how we’ve rallied this week.
“We’ve had our highs, we’ve had our lows, but what we showed today demonstrated the potential we’ve got going forward and it’s really exciting.”
Canada reached the play-offs with a highly impressive record of nine wins and just two losses, including a dominant 8-1 win over Scotland, but having previously won Paralympic gold in athletics before her recent switch of sports to curling, Butterfield knows what it takes to win medals on the world stage and now has her sights on doing so again.
“We now face Canada and we were disappointed with how we performed when we played against them in the round-robin game, so we’ve got another re-match and a chance to put the record right and if we play like we did against Korea then we’ll give them a good game,” she said.
“If we play our best game yet it’s going to be tough to beat us.
“We are very confident, riding high on the momentum of the win over Korea, so fresh game, new day and we are ready to fight for it.
“It’s getting to the very end and it’s great that we know we’ve got two more games and now we’re so close and can feel it, I want a medal and we all as a team want that.
“So it goes back to that cliché of one stone at a time, one end at a time and if we execute our shots as well as we did against Korea and even better we give ourselves a good shout.”
The Yorkshire-born athlete also paid tribute to the performance of British Curling squadmate Stewart Pimblett and his partner Rosemary Lenton who have secured England a place in the play-offs at the World Wheelchair Mixed Doubles Championship that are also taking place in Richmond, Vancouver this week with an 8-6 win over Denmark which took them to a record of six wins and just two defeats.
“We’re delighted for Rosemary and Stu in the mixed doubles, because they’ve had quite a commanding week,” said Butterfield.
“I know Stu pretty well from the programme and he really does work hard. I’m really chuffed for him, because he’s been playing some very good curling.
“It’s also great to see that British Curling is developing some strength in depth and that it’s not just Scotland any more. 
“Hopefully that can continue to grow over this cycle, so that come the Paralympics we’ve got a real opportunity to pick the best team for Milan/Cortina.”
After a slow start to that event Scotland’s Charlotte McKenna and David Melrose, who retired from international sport after last year’s Paralympics but had a late recall to national duty after Robert McPherson was ruled out through illness, also finished strongly in the Mixed Doubles, beating the USA 6-1 and Poland 9-8 on the final day of round-robin play.
That left them on a record of four wins and five losses, missing out by just a single victory on joining England in the play-offs.
England now face the USA in the first round of the play-offs.
Scotland Team Results
Day One
Scotland – Korea 4-6
Scotland – USA 4-7
Day Two
Scotland – Sweden 10-1
Scotland – Denmark 6-4
Day Three
Scotland – Latvia 3-6
Scotland – Czech Republic 9-3
Day Four
Scotland – Japan 6-2
Scotland – Canada 1-8
Day Five
Scotland – Norway 6-5
Scotland – China 2-9
Day Six
Scotland – Italy 6-9
Day Seven
Scotland – Korea 6-2
England Team Mixed Doubles Results
Day One
England – Italy 7-6
Day Two
England – Sweden 9-4
England – Latvia 4-8
Day Three
England – Korea 6-5
Day Four
England – Japan 6-4
Day Five
England – Canada 1-9
Day Six
England – Germany 8-4
Day Seven
England – Denmark 8-6
Scotland Team Mixed Doubles Results
Day One
Scotland - Hungary 3-9
Day Two
Scotland - China 3-10
Day Three
Scotland – Slovakia 0-8
Scotland – Norway 6-11
Day Four
Scotland – Estonia 10-9
Dave Five
Scotland – Switzerland 11-3
Day Six
Scotland – Finland 6-7
Day Seven
Scotland – USA 6-1
Scotland – Poland 9-8
The World Wheelchair Curling Championships and World Wheelchair Mixed Doubles Champs are being run in parallel at the Richmond Curling Centre in British Columbia (4-12 March).
The participating 12 teams in the World Wheelchair Curling Championships are hosts Canada, China, Czech Republic, Denmark, Italy, Japan, Korea, Latvia, Norway, Scotland, Sweden and United States.
The World Wheelchair Mixed Doubles Champs participating teams are:
Group A: China, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Norway, Poland, Scotland, Slovakia, Switzerland and United States.
Group B: Canada, Denmark, England, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Latvia and Sweden.
Please click here for more information from the World Curling Federation
Watch games on Recast
Scotland Mixed Doubles Team:
Charlotte McKenna
David Melrose
England Mixed Doubles Team
Rosemary Lenton
Stewart Pimblett
Scotland Team:
Jo Butterfield (MBE)
Meggan Dawson-Farrell
Gregor Ewan
Gary Logan
Hugh Nibloe
IMAGES: WCF/Cheyenne Boone
#curling #WWhCC2023 #WWhMDCC2023
