Nova Scotia skip Colleen Jones guides her team's rock in to the house during Scott Tournament of Hearts final against Team Canada in Charlottetown on Feb. 28, 1999.CHUCK STOODY/The Canadian Press
Colleen Jones was in almost perpetual motion during waking hours as she became one of the world’s all-time top curlers, and a groundbreaking CBC television broadcaster.
Ms. Jones, who died in Maders Cove, N.S., on Nov. 25 after a 32-month battle with colon cancer, set just a few priorities in life – but she stuck with each one with fierce loyalty.
She was devoted to curling, in which she excelled for five decades; her family; and the CBC, where she was one of Canada’s first female sportscasters and a risk-taking reporter for almost 40 years.
Her seemingly simple approach to living reaped huge rewards. She captured a record six Canadian women’s curling titles while competing an unmatched 21 times at the Scotties (and previously Scott) Tournament of Hearts. She also earned two world women’s titles; a slew of other provincial, national and championships in the junior, senior and mixed categories; and numerous off-ice awards. In 2022, she was named to the Order of Canada.
Ms. Jones is invested as a member of the Order of Canada by Governor-General Mary Simon during a ceremony at Rideau Hall in Ottawa on Dec. 12, 2024.PATRICK DOYLE/The Canadian Press
“I don’t think there will ever be anyone like her in terms of her commitment and drive,” said Perry Lefko, the co-author of her 2015 autobiography Throwing Rocks at Houses: My Life In and Out of Curling. (The title is a play on words: The rings on a curling sheet are known as the house, and a team scores by placing its rocks on or closest to the painted button at the centre of the house.)
“She was such a pioneer in her curling career and her broadcasting career,” Mr. Lefko added.
On television, Ms. Jones loved telling stories of regular people she described as “everyday heroes.” She often reported from a first-person perspective, engaging in such activities as bungee jumping, skydiving and roller derby.
“She packed more into her 65 years than most people would in two lifetimes,” Mr. Lefko said. “She had a zest for living, to just do something every day instead of letting time pass her by. She only lived to be 65 but she didn’t waste a day of her life. Man, she was doing something every day, whether it was curling or whether it was her career, whether it was just being a mother.”
The order of Ms. Jones’s priorities varied slightly, depending on what she was doing at the time. But the roaring game (as curling is known because of the sound the customized granite rock makes while sliding on ice) was at the root of her existence.
Curling flowed through her life like the blood in her body.
“My whole life has been shaped around curling and throwing rocks,” she said in a CBC video tribute that aired on the day of her death.
“All my friends are through curling. I got my husband through curling. I planned my babies around curling. I got my career because of curling. You wouldn’t think that a simple game that is your passion can lead to so many other things in your life; but it has, and it did, and I’m thankful for it.”
Ms. Jones after winning gold at the world curling championships in Gavle, Sweden, on April 24, 2004.ANDREW VAUGHAN/The Canadian Press
Colleen Patricia Jones was born into a curling sisterhood on Dec. 16, 1959, in Halifax. She was the fifth of nine children raised by Malachi and Anne Marie (née MacDonald) Jones – eight girls and a boy, who was the youngest and did not curl. Colleen was named after an older sister who died at birth.
“Mom would always say that she had that little saint on her side,” Colleen’s son Luke Saunders said.
Malachi Jones was a prominent jurist, serving as a Nova Scotia government lawyer and a judge in three of the province’s courts; her mother, who went by Anne, was a homemaker and ran the household. Both were non-curlers, but allowed their daughters to take up the sport when they were 14 and could lift a heavy curling stone.
Colleen’s youth had a certain innocence, she wrote in her autobiography, adding that all of the Jones children were united and there was no fighting among them, because their parents would not tolerate any. Curling was an obsession, rather than a game, during her childhood, she wrote.
Rising numbers of Canadians get swept up in discovering curling
“I loved it because my sisters were doing it and then I wanted to be as good as them,” she told CBC.
Soon after she joined the Mayflower Curling Club in Halifax, sliding along the ice felt completely natural to her. In 1982, Ms. Jones, 22, became the youngest Canadian women’s curling champion as she skipped a rink that included her sisters Barbara and Monica, and Kay Smith to glory in Regina.
Ms. Jones was among the first Canadian curlers to work out year-round and consult a sports psychologist, Ken Bagnell, who also served as her curling coach. She also followed a strict diet. But despite her early success, 17 years passed before Ms. Jones won another Canadian title, at the 1999 Scott Tournament of Hearts.
In an interview with CBC colleague and close friend Devin Heroux for a posthumous tribute, she called overcoming that 17-year gap her proudest achievement. It was as though Ms. Jones had finally found the “formula” for winning after struggling for so many years, Mr. Lefko said.
From left: Team Canada third Kim Kelly, skip Ms. Jones and lead Nancy Delahunt celebrate their victory over Team Sweden at the world curling championships in Gavle on April 20, 2004.ANDREW VAUGHAN/The Canadian Press
Close friend Marilyn Bodogh, a two-time Canadian women’s champion and two-time world title holder, considers herself lucky that it took Ms. Jones until the turn of the 21st century to discover her “magic” and become a “steamroller” who was “beating everybody.”
“She was a player who was stubborn,” Ms. Bodogh said. “Her equipment was old. She wasn’t learning. She was getting to the Scotties and couldn’t draw.”
(A draw is a type of curling shot. Many skips have won championships by placing a draw on or near the button with the final throw and the game on the line. And several skips have also lost titles because they failed in their attempts.)
“I said to her, ‘Colleen, your equipment’s old and you’re practising [at home] on heavy [i.e. slow] ice,’” Ms. Bodogh recalled. “‘We’ve got beautiful ice at the Scotties.’ So, she changed her equipment. I should never have told her that, because she won four straight Scotties.”
Ms. Jones captured the record four consecutive Canadian women’s titles between 2001 and 2004. She also led her crew, which included Kim Kelly, Nancy Delahunt and Mary-Anne Arsenault, to their two world championships during that stretch.
Ms. Jones follows the rock as third Kim Kelly, left, and second Mary-Anne Arsenault sweep against New Brunswick in draw eight at the Scott Tournament of Hearts women's curling championships in St. John's on Feb. 21, 2005.ANDREW VAUGHAN/The Canadian Press
“It was a wonderful ride,” Ms. Kelly said. “Colleen was such an upfront, strong leader. We were like her little ducklings. She was Mother Duck and she decided most of the time what course we would take, how we would do it, and she taught us how to compete and how to be winners, because she just knew.”
Ms. Jones often began her CBC split shift early in the morning, came to curling practice in the middle of the day, and then raced out the door to submit a TV feature by her late-afternoon deadline – often without knowing the topic but never failing to find a good story, Ms. Kelly recalled.
“Most of us live within a relatively narrow spectrum,” said Ms. Kelly. “We play it careful, the majority of people, just because it’s safer that way. But Colleen lived way outside the margins. She took chances. She was very brave – and disorganized – but she just always believed it would work, and it did.”
Ms. Jones shows off her gold medal at the closing ceremonies of the world curling championships in Lausanne, Switzerland, on April 8, 2001.ANDREW VAUGHAN/The Canadian Press
Although the term “icon” is tossed around a lot these days, Ms. Jones was one, said sports columnist Terry Jones, who takes great pride in being listed next to Ms. Jones in the Canadian Curling Hall of Fame.
Mr. Jones, who is based in Edmonton, mostly covered men’s curling powerhouses from the Alberta capital during their heydays, rather than major women’s competitions, so he knew Ms. Jones mainly as a media colleague. They forged a strong friendship while covering various events around the world, including Olympic and Commonwealth Games. The two Joneses enjoyed many social activities together during those times, including a lobster lunch at Ms. Jones’s Halifax home with her family and colleagues during the world junior hockey championships.
“I think most of my sports media colleagues enjoyed her because of her engaging personality and ability to fit in as one of the boys,” Mr. Jones said.
Ms. Jones’s most exciting and meaningful curling moment, she told Mr. Heroux, came as a coach – rather than a competitor – during the 2024 Canadian men’s championships in Kelowna, B.C. She was mentoring Team Owen Purcell, which included her son Luke. Her charges became the first Nova Scotia foursome in nearly two decades to qualify for the Brier playoffs.
Ms. Jones throws a football with her son, Luke, in March, 2004, after arriving home from her fourth straight Canadian women's curling championship.Sandor Fizli/The Globe and Mail
Mr. Saunders was the only team member who knew of his mother’s illness. Ms. Jones kept her condition private, only telling family and close friends. She did not want to face constant inquiries about her health or subject her loved ones to questions, she told Mr. Heroux. While helping her son’s team excel in 2024, she also helped guide Team Heather Smith to the Nova Scotia women’s title, recording a rare coaching sweep of the province’s two toughest annual curling competitions.
Mr. Saunders credits his mother’s cancer journey for saving his life. As a result of her diagnosis, he underwent screening and subsequently had potentially cancerous growths removed. Ms. Jones told Luke and his brother, Zach, that she was glad she got the disease instead of them.
“She was just working on a level that was so above the norm of kindness,” Luke said. “It was tremendous to watch her try to fight back.”
A provincial jacket belonging to Ms. Jones hangs in a suite as friends and family watch the Montana's Canadian Curling Trials women's semifinal in Halifax on Nov. 27.Darren Calabrese/The Canadian Press
Curling events were just some of Ms. Jones’s numerous globetrotting activities during her final 32 months. Among the events she took part in this year, she officiated at Mr. Heroux’s August wedding in Toronto as he married his performing-artist husband Felander Stevenson. Before that, she also travelled to Toronto to see Mr. Stevenson perform in The Lion King; attended a Bruce Springsteen concert in Lille, France; threw rocks during a promotional appearance at a Grand Slam of Curling event in Nashville; collaborated on renovations to her recreational property in Maders Cove; and attended her induction into the Nova Scotia Sports Hall of Fame – shortly after undergoing a cancer-induced emergency hip replacement.
In 2023, following the cancer diagnosis, her numerous pursuits included attending a Springsteen concert in Zurich.
“There was no stopping her,” Ms. Kelly said. “She lived, lived, lived till she just couldn’t. It was not her idea to go – that’s for sure.”
Ms. Jones died at her second home in Maders Cove with family members by her side. She leaves her husband, Scott Saunders; sons, Luke and Zach Saunders; sisters, Roseanne Williams, Barbara Jones-Gordon, Monica Moriarty, Maureen Savoy, Sheila Zeyha, Jennifer Springstead and Stephanie Carne; brother, Stephen Jones; grandson, Nathaniel Saunders; and father-in-law, Reg Saunders.
Colleen Jones, a world champion curler whose effervescent personality made her a popular presence on the CBC, has died. She was 65.
The Canadian Press
You can find more obituaries from The Globe and Mail here.
To submit a memory about someone we have recently profiled on the Obituaries page, e-mail us at obit@globeandmail.com.