Canadian curling in crisis as heavily favored men's, women's teams falter

Since curling was added to the Winter Olympics as a permanent fixture in 1998, Canada has never failed to win a medal.

That streak is in serious peril, with its heavily favored men's and women's teams - both reigning gold medalists - struggling in PyeongChang in a way Canadian curling fans have never seen.

Rachel Homan's team was the first to show warning signs, opening the tournament with a shocking 8-3 loss to hosts South Korea. Concern quickly turned to panic as Team Homan followed the loss with two more defeats. Along the way, Canada's women uncharacteristically missed easy shots, with the typically cold-blooded skipper herself turning in some of the worst botches.

Since then, Homan has won three straight to climb from the bottom of the table to semifinals contention.

Crisis averted? More like crisis relocated.

Canada's men cruised through their first four games, all wins, but since then Kevin Koe's rink has hit the skids and lost three straight themselves, including Canada's first-ever loss to rivals the United States at the Olympics.

"Teams are standing on their heads against us and we're not responding," lead Ben Hebert told CBC's Devin Heroux after the most recent loss. "We better find a way our next two games or we're out of here quick."

Indeed, Canada's advancement to the semifinals is far from a lock for the men and women, something that would've been unthinkable for Canadian curling fans before the tournament began.

Losing games, let alone losing streaks, is entirely unfamiliar for Canada. Recent gold medalists Kevin Martin and Jennifer Jones went through their tournaments without tasting defeat. Brad Jacobs starting the Sochi tournament 1-2 constituted a major crisis at the time; he never lost again en route to gold.

Canada held a hockey summit amid national panic following the failure of the men's hockey team in Nagano. There, Canada's failure was debated and a plan was formulated to return the nation to hockey glory. The result: gold in Salt Lake City, then two more golds in Vancouver and Sochi.

Unless Canada's curlers figure things out and return home from PyeongChang with new jewelry around their necks, a curling summit could be next.