BEIJING — First, Tabitha Peterson lost her voice. Then, her team lost its match, falling 10-5 to Great Britain to absorb its first defeat at the Beijing Games.
After rolling to a 3-0 record in the first two days of the women's curling tournament, Team Peterson couldn't figure out the changing ice conditions Saturday night in the Ice Cube. It conceded after nine ends, and Peterson immediately hustled out of the arena to rest her voice. The loss dropped the U.S. out of a first-place tie, leaving Switzerland — an 8-5 winner over Denmark — alone at the top with a 4-0 record.
Peterson's team is still in excellent position, tied with Japan for second place at 3-1 with five more round-robin matches. The top four teams advance to the semifinals. Her sister, Tara, expects the group to bounce back quickly. She figures Tabitha will, too.
"We're used to it,'' Tara said. "She loses her voice a lot in curling games. We just rely on hand signals and non-verbal communication.''
In a rough day on the pebbled ice, the U.S. men lost as well, dropping a 7-6 decision to Norway. They followed with a 10-5 loss to Canada on Sunday morning China time, giving up four points in the second end and falling behind 7-1 after five.
That decision left John Shuster's rink with a 2-3 record and in a tie for sixth place with Norway and China, which they will face later Sunday (6:05 a.m. Minnesota time).
Though Peterson was keeping quiet Saturday, the Ice Cube was getting louder. The Olympic curling tournament can be surprisingly raucous when all four ice sheets are in use, as four skips bellow out instructions.
The invited Chinese spectators are supposed to keep their mouths closed, since yelling, chanting and singing are banned to try to limit the spread of COVID-19. They abandoned those rules in Saturday night's round-robin session, swept away by China's 9-6 victory over Sweden. It was the host country's first win in the women's tournament.
Team Peterson fell behind 4-0 after two ends, as Great Britain scored two points in the opening end and stole two more in the second. A nice draw by Tabitha Peterson pulled the U.S. within 4-2, and another two points in the sixth end cut the Brits' margin to 5-4.
But the U.S. was outscored 5-1 in the final three ends. Tabitha Peterson shot only 57% for the game, well behind British skip Eve Muirhead's 83%. Tara Peterson, who plays lead, was the only U.S. player to outshoot her British counterpart.
"The ice is a little bit different from our last games,'' Tara Peterson said. "It straightened up a little bit, and it took us a little bit of time to figure that out. And Eve's team played fantastic. They figured it out a lot quicker than we did, and we were just chasing the whole time.''
Peterson said her team still feels good about how things are unfolding. After the match, Tabitha planned to soothe her throat with some special tea. Tara is confident her sister's voice will come back, and so will the team. The U.S. plays Sweden on Sunday (12:05 a.m. Minnesota time).
"We definitely didn't have our strongest game, but it's just something we've got to forget about,'' she said. "We have to move on and come out swinging [Sunday].''
