Hosts Canada top table on day one of World Women’s 2026

After Saturday’s opening day of the BKT World Women’s Curling Championship 2026 in Calgary, hosts Canada stand alone at the top of the table with two wins and no losses.

The Canadians started their campaign with a hard-fought 7-5 win over Sweden and then came back onto the ice in the evening session to face United States.

Karlee Burgess, Canada © World Curling / Stephen Fisher

This game was tight at the start, but, in the fourth end, with the score tied at 1-1, Canada’s skip Kerri Einarson took out a lone American stone in the house and kept her shooter in position to score three points and take a 4-1 lead. After this, Canada remained in control and went on to win by 11-3 — their second win of the day to put them in clear top position on the ranking table.

Speaking after her win over Sweden, Einarson said, “We gave up a deuce in the first end, but we figured it out after that. I haven’t played on this ice at a worlds for a long time. It’s not every day you get to play in Canada with a maple leaf on your back. You want to feed off the crowd, so it’s pretty amazing.”

Valerie Sweeting, Canada © World Curling / Stephen Fisher

Behind Canada, four further teams sit without a loss, but all have played only one game.

Denmark beat debutants Australia by 11-7 in the evening session. In this game, the Australians led by 5-4 as the teams played the seventh end. However, Danish skip Madeleine Dupont then drew her final stone to sit beside two existing counters that sat inside a collection of Australia stones out front. This let them score three points and take a 7-5 lead on the way to an opening 11-7 victory.

Madeleine Dupont (Denmark) and Helen Williams (Australia) after their game © World Curling / Anil Mungal

Japan beat Switzerland by 6-3 in the opening session. As the teams played the eighth end of this game, Japan held a 5-1 lead. However, Switzerland skip Xenia Schwaller then took out a Japan stone with a nose-hit to score two points and reduce the Japanese lead to 5-3. Despite this, Japan held on to eventually win by 6-3 in nine ends.

Speaking later, their skip Fujisawa Satsuki said, “We’re very happy to win. Yoshida Chinami (third player) played great today. We had a good focus — that’s why we had a good performance and got a great result.”

Fujisawa Satsuki, Japan © World Curling / Anil Mungal

Korea opened their campaign in the evening session against Italy. By the ninth end of this game, Korea had built a 10-5 lead. Then, in the ninth, Italy skip Stefania Constantini tried to draw inside four Korea stones. However, she came up short, giving Korea a steal of four points that sealed their 14-5 win.

After the game, Korea skip Gim Eunji was happy with her team’s performance, and said, “We just want to rack up the wins now and reach the play-offs, after that… we’ll see.”

Seol Yeeun and Kim Suji, Korea © World Curling / Anil Mungal

The fourth undefeated team are Turkiye, who beat Norway by 8-7 in the opening session.

In the seventh end, Turkiye held a 4-3 lead when their skip Dilsat Yildiz added three more points with a well-judged draw into a busy house, improving her team’s lead to 7-3. It took all the way to an extra end, but Turkiye then went on to win by 8-7.

After this win, Yildiz said, “We are happy to win our first game. I think it was a close game. We thought we’d lost it a bit when we had to play an extra end, but we want to make the play-offs here.”

Dilsat Yildiz, Turkiye © World Curling / Stephen Fisher

China and Switzerland sit behind all these unbeaten teams on one win and one loss, while the remaining six teams behind them are still looking for a first win.