Canadian curling women require extra end to book world semifinal date with Norway

Gritty. Tenacious. Plucky. It sums up Saturday's 6-4 extra-end win over Japan, putting Canada skip Kerri Einarson's women's team in an 11 a.m. ET semifinal against Norway at the world curling championships in Sandviken, Sweden.

Vice-skip Val Sweeting, second Shannon Birchard, lead Briane Harris and Einarson scored two in the decisive 11th end to book a date with Norwegian skip Marianne Roervik at Goeransson Arena.

"It's been a bit of a gritty week with ups and downs, but we've put ourselves in a good position now," Sweeting told Curling Canada. "We just have to keep rolling and keep our opportunities coming. If we set ourselves up and capitalize, I think we'll be good. We're comfortable in this situation."

In the extra end, Canada froze onto Japan's second-shot stone, eliminating an easy path for its opponent to remove it and forcing skip Satsuki Fujisawa to play a challenging raise. It left Einarson and company sitting two with no need to throw its last.

"That was a pistol draw. I found that the ice was quick for the front end, but then it was even faster for Kerri and I, the fastest we've seen in some of those spots," Sweeting said. "I felt like I was crawling out of the hack and it was still in. We know that going forward and how fast it will be, so we know we need to leave it to our brushers because they'll get it there."

In the other qualification game, Sweden's Anna Hasselborg topped Italy's Stefania Constantini 4-3 and will play Silvana Tirinzoni's undefeated squad from Switzerland in the second semifinal, also at 11 a.m.

The winners advance to Sunday's gold-medal match at 9 a.m. ET, while the losing squads compete for bronze at 4 a.m.

With ice conditions changing throughout the Canada/Japan game, the Canadians