The 2023 Scotties Tournament of Hearts will begin on Friday in Kamloops, British Columbia. For the third straight year, there will be an 18-team field with a representative from every province and territory. Once again, there will be two representatives from Ontario (Ontario and Northern Ontario), a Team Canada (the defending champion), and three Wildcard teams (the best three teams in Canada from the Canadian Team Ranking System standings that did not previously qualify by either winning the 2022 Scotties Tournament of Hearts in Thunder Bay, Ontario are a provincial or territorial championship).
Some of the more notable names at the 2023 Scotties are Team Canada skip Kerri Einarson of Selkirk, Manitoba, Canadian Olympic gold medalists Jennifer Jones and Kaitlyn Lawes of Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Rachel Homan of Ottawa, Ontario. Einarson is a three-time Scotties champion (2020 in Moose Jaw, 2021 in Calgary and 2022 in Thunder Bay), and won a bronze medal for Canada at the 2022 World Women’s Curling Championship in Prince George. Jones won a gold medal skipping Canada at the 2014 Olympic Winter Games in Sochi, with Lawes as her third. In Kamloops this week, Jones is skipping Manitoba, while Lawes is skipping the first Wildcard team. Homan meanwhile won the gold medal for Canada at the 2017 World Women’s Curling Championship in Beijing, and is skipping Team Ontario. The winner of the 2023 Scotties Tournament of Hearts will represent Canada at the 2023 Women’s World Curling Championships in Sandviken, Sweden from March 18-26.
