Scoring game curling

Curling requires a lot of precision and strategy. Teams try to land their own throws as close as possible, but they may also aim to knock their opponents' stones out of the house, which prevents them from being scored. Each member of a team throws twice in an end, including the "skip," or team captain, who determines overall strategy. When they're not throwing, everyone except the skip is tasked with sweeping, which is probably the most iconic image from the sport.

Players run in front of the stone and buff the ice with brooms to reduce friction and make the stone slide more easily. Sweeping, too, is very strategic, as it can be used to speed up stones that are moving too slowly or adjust the trajectory of one that's curving in the wrong direction.

However, sweeping in front of a stone that's already going too fast can result in it overshooting the house. Scoring happens after each "end," or after each team has thrown eight stones. First, the teams must determine who got a stone closest to the button. Since the bottom of the stone is rounded, a " stone " just barely in the " house " will not have any actual contact with the ring, which will pass under the rounded edge of the " stone ", but it still counts; this type of " stone " is known as a " biter ".

If at the end of an " end " no " stone " is in the " house " no team scores in this " end "; this situation is called " blank end ". Curling is played by sliding stones across a sheet of ice towards the " House ," which is a bullseye made up of three concentric circles. Points are scored by throwing sliding stones into the bullseye, aka the House. Two teams of four face against one another to see who can score the most points.

Every player throws two stones for a total of 16 stones being thrown. Throws alternate between teams so one player throws their two stones then another player on the other team throws their two.

Once the 16 stones have been thrown, the round, which is referred to as an end , is over and the points are tallied. In an end, only one team will score points. The team with the stone, or stones, closest to the center of the house will be awarded the points for that end. A point is scored for each stone, in or touching the house, that is closer to the center than any of the opposing team's stones.

Each stone can only be worth one point so getting closer to the center of the house doesn't necessarily result in more points, a team can score a max of eight points in an end. If by the end there is only one stone in the house, only one point will be scored, regardless of its location. Since there are three yellow stones closer than the red stone, the yellow team will earn three points.

Previous Next. Table of Contents. Scoring Rules After an end is complete, the vices from each team will work together to agree upon the score.

There are three general rules to know about scoring in curling : Only one team can score in the end. Any stone that is touching some part of the house can earn their team a point. Each stone, regardless of its location in the house, is worth only one point.

As the vices work to score the end, they follow these two rules to determine the score: The team with the stone closest to the button will win the end, and receive 1 point for that stone.

The team that wins the end will earn additional points for any other stones closer to the button than their opponent's closest stone. Scoring an End Consider the house below, with three yellow stones and one red stone.

Step 1: Determine Which Stone is Closest to the Button In curling, the stone that is closest to the button is called the "shot rock" or "shot stone.