Canada’s Rachel Homan wins bronze in women’s Olympic curling

Rachel Homan will finally take home an Olympic medal.

Canada scored three in the eighth end to break the game apart and secure its 10-7 bronze-medal victory over the United States’ Team Tabitha Peterson at Milano Cortina 2026.

The Ottawa-based rink made up of skip Homan, third Tracy Fleury, second Emma Miskew, and lead Sarah Wilkes have officially become Olympic medalists.

Team Homan escaped the eighth end with the lead after Peterson’s triple takeout attempt fell short and only moved one. Homan made a perfect draw with her last shot to lock in a three-point edge and give the Canadians an 8-5 lead.

The U.S. battled back in the ninth end to score a deuce and close the gap to one, but Canada, up 7-6, had the hammer for the 10^th.

In the first half of the game, neither rink dared to take costly risks in such a close medal contest leading to just a single point being scored by the team holding hammer each end. Team Peterson had a one point lead at the fifth-end break, but from there it was all Canada.

In the sixth end Canada scored three to take the first significant lead. But in seventh, Peterson shot a well-managed draw through a tight port to score two and tie it up.

Canada outcurled the U.S. 89 -79 per cent and scored eight of its 10 points in the final five ends. The Americans only had four points through the second half.

After struggling to deliver consistent draws throughout the tournament, Fleury finally found her draw weight in this last all-important medal game.

This was Homan’s third Olympic Games and her first medal. In both 2018 and 2022 she missed the playoff round in the women’s and mixed disciplines respectively. Going into Milano Cortina 2026 she was ranked No. 1 in the world, a position she’s held for 83 weeks since the start of the 2023-24 season.

After starting 1-3, Team Homan ran the table and won five straight to reach the playoffs. One of those initial preliminary losses came 9-8 at the hands of the Americans.

In the last two years, Homan has earned a 198-31 record, two undefeated Scotties titles, back-to-back world championships, six grand slam events, and now an Olympic medal.

This is Canada’s first women’s curling medal since Jennifer Jones won gold in Sochi 2014.