Colleen Jones

Colleen P. Jones (born December 16, 1959 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada) is a Canadian curler and television personality. She is best known as the skip of two women's world championship teams and six Tournament of Hearts Canadian women's championships, including an unprecedented four titles in a row and a record 138 wins as a skip.^[1] She also serves as a reporter and weather presenter for the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and as a curling commentator for the National Broadcasting Company in the United States, particularly during the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Early career

From a family of curlers, at age 14, she joined the Mayflower Curling Club. At an early age, she gained success in competitive curling and was only 19 years old when she won the first of her 16 Nova Scotia curling titles. That led to competing in the Canadian championships, where she finished second. Jones graduated from Dalhousie University and went to work in broadcasting in her native Halifax.

In 1982 she became the youngest skip, at age 22, ever to win the Canadian women's curling championship but career, marriage and a family slowed down her competitive curling. She joined CBC Television as a reporter in 1986 and went on to cover numerous summer and winter Olympic Games. She continues to work for the CBC, and is currently the weather and sports reporter on CBC Newsworld's CBC News: Morning.

Broadcasting career

Jones began her broadcasting career in radio sports at CHUM radio in 1982. She made the switch to television broadcasting in 1984 at CTV, and joined the CBC in 1986.^[2] Beginning in 1993, Jones has been the weather presenter and sports reporter for CBC Morning News on CBC Newsworld (now CBC News Network). At the 2006 Torino Olympics, she did CBC segments about curling. Jones provided curling commentary for NBC's coverage of the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver.

Jones starred in a public service announcement about the Canada 2006 Census. Jones appeared in the January 15, 2008 episode of This Hour Has 22 Minutes for a skit titled MVC Most Valuable Curler.

Curling career

1999-2006

In 1999, with her new team of Kim Kelly, Mary Anne Waye (later Arsenault) and Nancy Delahunt, Jones won the Canadian curling title for the second time. The team repeated this in 2001 and they went on to win the World Curling Championship in Lausanne, Switzerland. They followed this up with another Canadian championship in 2002 and then won it for a record-setting fifth time at the 2004 Scott Tournament of Hearts. This made Jones the first skip to win four straight Canadian titles. From there the team went on to win their second World Curling Championship.

Their return at the 2005 Scott Tournament of Hearts was not as stellar. The team finished the round-robin at 6-5 and lost in a tie-breaker to Sandy Comeau of New Brunswick. When this happened, the team got a standing ovation, which even halted play in the other game that was occurring two sheets over. The following year, the team was back in form, but bowed out in the semi-finals to Jennifer Jones. At the end of the 2006 season, the team broke up. Jones joined the team of fellow Haligonian Kay Zinck, as her third. The rest of the team got a new skip in Laine Peters.

2006-2008

After a short run playing third for Kay Zinck during the 2006/2007 season, Jones went back to skipping. For the 2007/2008 season she would add Olympic bronze medallist Georgina Wheatcroft to her team along with Kate Hamer and Darah Provencal. At the end of the season Jones would retire from competitive curling.

2010-2011

Colleen Jones announced on March 24, 2010 on CBC News that she would be again returning to competitive curling. Having been present for the 2010 Vancouver Olympics, a spark ignited in her, and she once again wanted to make another run for the 2014 Olympics in Sochi.

For the 2010/2011 season, Jones was recruited by Heather Smith-Dacey, Blisse Comstock and Teri Lake, to take over skipping duties, when former skip Jill Mouzar moved to Ontario. Just as Jones was due to begin her competitive curling comeback, days before beginning the playdowns for the Nova Scotia Scotties Tournament of Hearts, It was announced on December 10, 2010 that Jones was diagnosed with meningitis.^[3] Jones turned over skipping duties to Heather Smith-Dacey, and brought in Danielle Parsons to play at third. Smith-Dacey's team won the Nova Scotia title, and then went on to win the bronze medal at the 2011 Scotties. Jones was able to return to competition after recovering from her illness, and won the 2011 Nova Scotia Senior Women's Championship on February 27.^[4]

2011-Current

For the 2011-2012, Jones recruited a new squad, originally consisting of Kristen MacDiarmid, Helen Radford and Mary Sue Radford, all whom previous played with Theresa Breen. Later in the season, she modified her team adding former teammate Nancy Delahunt to third, and Marsha Sobey to second. Mary Sue Radford remained at lead. Delahunt and Sobey were members of Jones' Senior women's champion team. After failing to qualify for the provincial 2012 Nova Scotia Scotties Tournament of Hearts, Jones and her senior team of Delahunt, Sobey and Sally Saunders, participated in the 2012 Nova Scotia Women's Senior Championships. They made it to the final, where they defeated Colleen Pinkney 6-4 to win back-to-back seniors championships, qualifying for the National senior finals. With Delahunt skipping, and Jones throwing last stones, the team represented Nova Scotia at the 2012 Canadian Senior Curling Championships, where they lost in the semi-final to Newfoundland and Labrador's Cathy Cunningham.

For the 2012-2013 season Jones reunited with Mary-Anne Arsenault and Kim Kelly, with the goal of reaching the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.^[5] Jones throws second stones on the team, while acting as the rink's vice skip, or "mate" while Arsenault skips. ^[6]

The Arsenault-skipped team won the 2013 Nova Scotia Scotties Tournament of Hearts, and qualified for the 2013 Scotties Tournament of Hearts, February 16-24 in Kingston, Ontario. They finished the event with a 5-6 record.^[7]

Career highlights

Colleen Jones is a member of the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame, and has been in 7 Canadian Mixed Curling Championships, where she has won 2 titles (as vice-skip).

• Canadian Champion: 1982, 1999, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004
• World Curling Championship: 2001, 2004
• Canadian Mixed Curling Champion: 1993, 1999

Grand Slam record

Former Events

References