Veteran Swedish skip Niklas Edin scores late to cement 1st win at Tour Challenge

Reigning Olympic champion Niklas Edin earned his first win at the HearingLife Tour Challenge on Wednesday with a 9-4 victory over American John Shuster in Niagara, Falls, Ont.

The veteran Swede, who dropped his round-robin opener a day earlier, scored a deuce in the sixth end and added three more points in the seventh.

In other early games, Italy's Joel Retornaz beat Winnipeg's Reid Carruthers 4-2 and Japan's Riku Yanagisawa edged Calgary's Kevin Koe 6-5.

Ross Whyte topped reigning world champion Bruce Mouat 6-3 in a battle of Scottish rinks.

Three more draws were scheduled for later in the day.

Play continues through Sunday.

WATCH | That Curling Show — Reid Carruthers on how he keeps Zen under pressure:

In yet another nod to the sport's improved international depth, this season there are only 12 Canadian teams among the 32 total Tier-1 entries — six in the women's draw and six in the men's pool.

Nine different countries are represented in each 16-team draw.

Canada hasn't won a four-player team medal at the Games since 2014. The country's world championship drought dates back to 2017 for the men (Brad Gushue) and 2018 for the women (Jennifer Jones).

World ranking positions are used to determine the entries at the combined $400,000 competition.

Brendan Bottcher, Matt Dunstone, Gushue and Koe hold top-10 spots in the men's world rankings. Kerri Einarson, Kate Cameron, Rachel Homan and Jones are in the women's top 10.