OSTERSUND – At least one women's tiebreaker is confirmed for Friday as the playoff picture at the 2008 World Junior Curling Championships continues to develop.

Tonight's ninth and final women's draw will leave at least two teams tied for the fourth and final playoff position. Currently,  

Scotland's Eve Muirhead and Sweden's Cissi Ostlund are both in at 6-2, While Denmark's Madeleine Dupont and Russia's Liudmila Privivkova, the 2006 World Junior champion, are next in line at 5-3. Canada's Kaitlyn Lawes and Switzerland's Michele Jaeggi, the 2005 World Junior champion, are both at 4-4.

Due to the ninth draw matchups – which will see Canada and the Swiss play each other and Denmark and Russia also lock horns – a tiebreaker is guaranteed; only the identity of the combatants remain to be seen.

In eighth-round action, Scotland pummelled Russia 8-1, Sweden shaded Germany 6-4, Switzerland edged Japan 7-6 in an extra end, Denmark beat Norway 9-3 and Canada thumped the United States 9-2 in just six ends.

Canada's Kaitlyn Lawes already had a 5-0 lead when U.S. skip Nina Spatola left the match in the third end with an undisclosed knee injury. Teammate Rebecca Hamilton moved up to skip position, with Karlie Koenig taking over fourth stones.

In men's play, Sweden beat the Czech Republic 7-1, Canada lost their second game 9-8 to Norway and the United States took two in the 10th end to shade Germany 8-7. The results put Canada, Sweden and the Americans all into the semifinals at 6-2 with a game to play.

Switzerland lost its third in a row – a 6-4 upset to Scotland – to fall to 5-3. Also in the men's playoff mix is Denmark, who defeated China 8-2, and Norway, who are both at 4-4.

On Friday morning's final men's draw, Canada meets Switzerland, Denmark battles Germany, Norway meets the Czech Republic, Sweden takes on Scotland the the United States takes on China.

"Yeah, we're really pumped for playoffs," said U.S. skip Chris Plys, who is competing in his third consecutive World Junior Championship.

"Our goal all along was making the playoffs, and there's just one goal now.

We'll just try and win our game tomorrow to get us a shot at the one-two (playoff) game."

Real-time results are available at: www.curlingkanalen.se with daily results mirrored on the World Curling Federation website at: results.worldcurling.org

Curlingkanalen is also webcasting selected matches live during the championships, and the men's and women's playoffs will be broadcast on Eurosport's Swedish channel (semis March 8 at 1400 CST and the finals March 9 at 930 and 1400 CST).

The event host website is: www.wjcc2008.org