Team Einarson adds Karlee Burgess to lineup after her departure from Team Carey

Team Kerri Einarson is adding three-time world junior champion Karlee Burgess to its lineup. Manitoba third Burgess calls out to the sweepers after delivering a rock in the ninth end of the team's playoff win against Northern Ontario, at the Scotties Tournament of Hearts, in Kamloops, B.C., on Saturday, Feb. 25, 2023. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck

Team Kerri Einarson has added three-time world junior champion Karlee Burgess to its lineup as a replacement for Shannon Birchard, who will miss the rest of the season with a knee injury.

Curling Canada provided the team with an injury exemption, which allows it to maintain eligibility for the upcoming Scotties Tournament of Hearts.

Burgess, whose departure from Team Chelsea Carey was announced a day earlier, will move from third to the second position.

“She’s a great shotmaker,” Einarson said Friday from Gimli, Man. “But it’s her energy that she brings to the game, her excitement and her youth.”

The team also includes vice Val Sweeting and fifth Krysten Karwacki, who has been filling in for Briane Harris at lead.

Harris was provisionally suspended for up to four years last February after testing positive for a banned substance. The Court of Arbitration for Sport has yet to announce a decision on her appeal of the doping violation.

Einarson, a four-time national champion, has pre-qualified for the Feb. 14-23 playdowns in Thunder Bay, Ont.

The departure of Burgess from Carey’s team left that side with only two returning members from last season’s foursome skipped by Jennifer Jones that earned early qualification berths for the Scotties and the Canadian Curling Trials.

As a result, per Curling Canada rules, the team will no longer be eligible to claim those spots. Jones, who retired from the four-player game last spring, was replaced by Carey at the start of this season.

Edmonton’s Selena Sturmay is next on the 2023-24 team ranking list and will get the vacated Scotties berth, Curling Canada said in a release.

The vacated berth at the Nov. 22-30 Trials in Halifax, which will determine Canada’s representatives at the 2026 Milan Olympics, will now go to Einarson.

Birchard has missed most of the season with a knee injury. She returned at a tour event last month in Swift Current, Sask., but the pain returned and she couldn’t finish the competition.

Birchard will focus on rehabilitation and aims to be ready for the start of the 2025-26 season, the team said.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Jan. 3, 2025.