Canadian Trail: How Canada did today at the Olympics
Lawes, Morris golden in curling mixed doubles while luger Gough, speed skater Boutin win bronze
By Doug Harrison, CBC Sports
A week-long journey in South Korea featuring a tournament-opening loss, great shots and resilient play culminated in a gold medal Tuesday for Winnipeg's Kaitlyn Lawes and Ottawa's John Morris in the Winter Games debut of mixed doubles curling.
They defeated six-time world champions Jenny Perret and Martin Rios of Switzerland 10-3, highlighted by a score of four in the third end, to become Canada's first two-time Olympic curling champions.
Calgary's Alex Gough added Canada's first-ever luge medal with a bronze after speed skater Kim Boutin of Sherbrooke, Que., finished fourth in short track but was bumped up to third following the disqualification of South Korea's Minjeong Choi.
VIDEO | Canada's performances Tuesday in South Korea:
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Canada finished the day third in the medal standings with 10, including three gold, trailing Norway (11) and the Netherlands (10, four gold).
Here's how other Canadians fared on Tuesday:
Luge
Kim McRae, who began the day in sixth spot, finished fifth in three minutes, 5.878 seconds to match her result from four years ago at the Sochi Games in Russia.
Fellow Calgarian Brooke Apshkrum, 18, was 13th (3:07.102) in her Games debut, well back of winner Natalie Geisenberger, who captured her second consecutive gold medal in 3:05.232.
Short track
Marianne St-Gelais failed to make it out of the 500-metre quarter-finals at her final Winter Olympic Games after making contact with Yara Van Kerkhof of the Netherlands. The incident occured while jockeying for position and St-Gelais was penalized for impeding. A three-time Olympic medallist, the 27-year-old St-Gelais was also penalized for a false start.
She will compete in the 3,000 on Feb. 20 with teammates Jamie MacDonald, Kasandra Bradette and St-Gelais. MacDonald was penalized in Tuesday's 500 and didn't reach the quarter-finals at Gangneung Ice Arena.
In men's 1,000 qualifying, Charles Hamelin and Sam Girard finished top-two in their respective heats to reach the quarter-finals, while Charle Cournoyer didn't advance.
Pascal Dion, Hamelin, Girard and Cournoyer qualified second to China in their heat for the 5,000 relay final on Feb. 22.
Speed skating
Denny Morrison of Fort St. John, B.C., was the top Canadian (13th) in the men's 1,500 final, won by Kjeld Nuis of the Netherlands to give the Dutch four gold medals in as many men's races at these Games. They remain on the astounding medal pace set at the 2014 Sochi Olympics when then finished with 23 out of 36 medals.
Vincent de Haitre and Ben Donnelly also competed for Canada on Tuesday, placing 21st and 31st, respectively.
VIDEO | Denny Morrison: 'Defeat is temporary'
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Hockey
The Canadian women's team will carry a 2-0 record into Thursday's final preliminary-round game against their American rivals following a 4-1 defeat of Finland at the Kwandong Hockey Centre.
Meghan Agosta and Melodie Daoust led the way offensively with a goal and assist each for Canada, which blanked the Olympic Athletes of Russia 5-0 to open the tournament. Marie-Philip Poulin and Jillian Saulnier had the other goals for the Canadians, who controlled much of the game as Canada's men's squad watched from the upper tier of the arena.
Cross-country
Alex Harvey, 29, failed to build on an eighth-place performance in Sunday's 30-kilometre skiathlon, finishing a season-worst 32nd in the sprint classic and failed to advance past qualifying at the Alpensia Cross-Country Skiing Centre.
The three-time Olympian covered the 1.4-kilometre course in three minutes, 17.95 seconds – 9.41 seconds behind the winning time of Finland's Ristomatti Hakola.
Jesse Cockney and Russell Kennedy were also eliminated in the qualifications. In the women's sprint, Emily Nishikawa, Dahria Beatty and Cendrine Brown finished 34th, 42nd and 51st.
Skiing
Canada's top finish in the men's slalom final of the alpine combined came courtesy of Jack Crawford, who was 20th, followed by Broderick Thompson in 23rd, while Benjamin Thomsen didn't start the race. Six-time overall World Cup champion Marcel Hirscher of Austria won in a combined two-run time of two minutes 6.52 seconds.
Thompson was 22nd in the downhill portion to lead his team and Crawford placed 25th. Thomsen didn't start while Manny Osborne-Paradis, in his fourth attempt at an Olympic medal, missed the second gate and will look ahead to Wednesday's downhill at Jeongseon Alpine Centre.
Snowboarding
In women's halfpipe, Mercedes Nicoll (18th), Elizabeth Hosking (19th) and Calynn Irwin (23rd) failed to make the final race of 12.
Elsewhere, Derek Livingston was 17th of 29 in qualifying and didn't reach the final in men's halfpipe.