CHINA made history in Saturday evening’s Paralympic Winter Games PyeongChang 2018 gold medal final in the Gangneung Curling Center, when they defeated Norway 6-5 after an extra end to claim China’s first ever Paralympic Winter Games medals.

China — skipped by Haitao Wang, with third Jianxin Chen, second Wei Liu, lead Meng Wang and supported by alternate Qiang Zhang and coach Qingshuang Yue — opened the scoring with two points in the first end.

In the second end, Norway — skipped by Rune Lorentsen, with third Jostein Stordahl, second Ole Fredrik Syversen, lead Sissel Loechen and supported by alternate Rikke Ivesen and coach Peter Dahlman — scored a single point when Lorentsen tried to blank the end but his shooter stopped on the edge of the 12-foot.

The third end saw a rare mistake from Wang, when his final stone caught a Norway stone, sending it into the four-foot for a steal of two points, giving Norway the 3-2 lead. Wang leveled the scores in the fourth end with a hit for one point.

The second half remained tense, with Norway blanking the fifth end before Lorentsen was forced to hit for a single point in the sixth end.

In the eighth end, Lorentsen was again forced to hit for one point to take the game to an extra end and give up their last stone advantage.

In the extra end, China’s third player Chen played a precise draw around six guards to sit in the four-foot as shot stone. Lorentsen was unable to remove the stone with either of his two attempts, giving China the 6-5 victory and crowning them Paralympic wheelchair curling champions.

(SD-Agencies)