Alberta wins the 2016 Scotties

In the end, Northern Ontario's steal train couldn't make one last stop.

Instead, a mostly unstoppable Alberta express claimed the 2016 Scotties Tournament of Hearts title, with skip Chelsea Carey drawing the back of the four-foot with her last shot of the game, good for a 7-6 win over Krista McCarville's Thunder Bay crew.

“Terrifying,” laughed Carey, when she was asked by TSN's Bryan Mudryk what the moment before she slid from the hack felt like. “I made sure to take my time and take some deep breaths.”

“What more could you ask for? Team Alberta, in Alberta, and a win. I mean, it’s amazing,” she said.

This wasn't a spectacular victory but it was still an impressive one for the Calgary team which lost just twice in 13 games all week. While it lacked the same astonishing brute force of Alberta's win over Jennifer Jones and the defending champions in the 1 vs 2 playoff game on Friday night - Carey and her mates shot a sizzling 92% that night with the skip booking a 96% - it came with each and every one of the Alberta foursome making key shots at important times.

Third Amy Nixon booked a 90% in the final, making some tough line calls on Carey shots and helping keep her team out of trouble with sharp shooting in the seventh end. Second Jocelyn Peterman fired an 88%, complete with pistols in both the 5th and 7th ends. Alberta needed those particular accomplishments as Northern Ontario had them on the run in both ends, looking to sway the momentum of the game in their favour with elusive threes. Instead, McCarville had all she could handle in grabbing deuces, especially in the 7th when she made two pistol draws to collect the points.

So they needed to be that good, Alberta did, as McCarville brought her own top shelf performance to the game, shooting 86% after playoff performances that saw her in the 70's. She and her team couldn't pull out one more miracle, however, as they looked to steal in the tenth end to take the title.

That was good theatre, too, the script you'd like to see on the same night as the Oscars. Northern Ontario had given its competitors fits all week, especially in the second half of games as they'd stolen 16 total ends after the fifth end break, including two against Manitoba in the 3 vs 4 game and three against Jones and Team Canada in the semi-final.

However, that's when Alberta's veteran lead, Laine Peters, really cemented her comeback on a night that saw her struggle with a shooting percentage in the low 70's at the halfway point of the game. She made two tick shots on Northern Ontario guards to open the tenth end, making it much more difficult for McCarville's crew to fashion yet another win on a steal and capping her own personal surge to a game total of 83%. However, it wasn't the shooting that gave her the willies.

"I called it," she said after the game. "I said that if we make it to the final and we have a shot for the win, I know it's going to be that in-turn draw because I'll have to judge it and (Peterman) will sweep it and that is my fear," she laughed. "When she (Carey) let it go, I knew it was good."

And Carey put the stamp on things with that last rock in the tenth, needing full eight-foot to secure the winning point and grabbing a piece of the back four to do so.

The victory gave Carey's adopted province (she won silver as skip of Manitoba's entry in 2014) its seventh Canadian women's curling championship and third victory since the Scotties format began 35 years ago.

It's also a next-generation championship for the Careys. Father Dan, who was in attendance, won a Brier with Vic Peters in 1992.

“My dad’s the reason that I’m here," Carey told TSN. "Watching him is the reason that I curl. He’s taught me everything. I wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for him. As soon as we won, I was looking for him.”

It's on to the World Championship for the Alberta crew, to be held next month in Swift Current, Saskatchewan. If they hit the medal podium there, they'll earn an invitation to the 2017 Canadian Olympic Trials, a big carrot for any elite team.

“The only thing better than Team Alberta in Alberta is Team Canada in Canada," said Carey. "Can’t wait.”