Alina Pätz (born 8 March 1990 in Urdorf) is a Swiss curler from Matten bei Interlaken, Switzerland. She currently skips her own team. She won a silver medal at 2026 Winter Olympics as the fourth of the team skipped by Silvana Tirinzoni. Pätz has competed in nine World Women's Curling Championships, reaching the final eight times and winning six gold medals, tying her with Carole Howald for the curler with the most wins at the event. She also represented Switzerland at the Winter Olympics in 2014 and 2022. She is a two-time European champion, six-time Grand Slam champion, and the 2011 World Mixed Doubles champion.
Career Youth Pätz first represented Switzerland internationally at the 2010 European Mixed Curling Championship, playing lead for her brother Claudio Pätz. The team, also including Gioia Öchsle and Sven Michel, finished 6–1 in the round robin to advance to the playoffs. They then won both their quarterfinal and semifinal matches before losing to hosts Scotland in the gold medal game. Later that season, her junior rink won the Swiss Junior Curling Championships, sending them to the 2011 World Junior Curling Championships. There, the team finished 5–4 in the round robin before dropping a tiebreaker to Sweden's Sara McManus.
Women's In 2012, Pätz joined the Mirjam Ott rink as alternate for the 2012 World Women's Curling Championship, her first appearance at the event. After an 8–3 round robin record, they lost to Sweden in the 1 vs. 2 game but avenged this loss in the gold medal game to claim the world championship. She also served as Ott's alternate at the 2012 and 2013 European Curling Championships, winning bronze at the latter. Team Ott was selected to represent Switzerland at the 2014 Winter Olympics with Pätz making her Olympic debut. There, the team qualified for the playoffs as the third seed, however, lost both the semifinal and bronze medal game to finish fourth.
Following Ott's retirement in 2014, she began coaching Pätz' women's rink from Baden. The 2014–15 season was a breakthrough year for Pätz and teammates Nadine Lehmann, Marisa Winkelhausen and Nicole Schwägli. They won the 2014 Red Deer Curling Classic on the World Curling Tour, which was Pätz's first tour win. They also reached the final of the 2014 Stu Sells Oakville Tankard and the playoffs of the 2014 Masters and 2015 Players' Championship Grand Slam of Curling events. In the second half of the season, they won the International Bernese Ladies Cup and the Swiss Women's Curling Championship, qualifying them for the 2015 World Women's Curling Championship. Switzerland finished the round robin in first place with a 10–1 record. A victory over Canada's Jennifer Jones sent them to the final, where they once again faced Jones. Up 4–3 in the tenth end, Pätz drew to the button for the win, winning the World Championship gold medal and title.
The following season, Team Pätz won the right to represent Switzerland at the 2015 European Curling Championships, but they did not qualify for the playoffs, finishing 4–5. On tour, they did not win any events and only qualified at one of four Grand Slam events they played in, the 2015 Meridian Canadian Open. They were also unable to defend their title as world champions, losing in the Swiss championship to 2014 world champion Binia Feltscher. The 2016–17 season was more successful for the Swiss rink. They won the 2017 International Bernese Ladies Cup and made the final of the Glynhill Ladies International. They also won the Swiss championship and represented Switzerland at the 2017 World Women's Curling Championship. Despite starting 4–0, the team lost six of their last seven games, ultimately not qualifying for the playoffs. They ended their season by finishing second at the 2017 Euronics European Masters and making the semifinals of the 2017 Humpty's Champions Cup.
Team Pätz had several quarterfinal finishes during the 2017–18 season. They won the 2017 Stockholm Ladies Cup in October, defeating Kim Eun-jung in the final. The team then competed against the other top Swiss teams, Silvana Tirinzoni and Binia Feltscher, at the 2017 Swiss Olympic Curling Trials to choose the Swiss representative at the 2018 Winter Olympics. The event was ultimately won by the Tirinzoni rink, which finished 6–0. After failing to win the Swiss championship in February, the Pätz team disbanded.
Heading into the 2018–19 season, Pätz joined forces with Silvana Tirinzoni, who would skip the team, but Pätz would throw fourth rocks, with Esther Neuenschwander at second and Melanie Barbezat throwing lead rocks. In their first event, the team went undefeated at the Stu Sells Oakville Tankard until the final where they lost to Kerri Einarson. They also made the final in the first Grand Slam of the season, the Elite 10. In November 2018, they represented Switzerland at the 2018 European Curling Championships and claimed the silver medal. They were an unbeaten 9–0 in the round robin and defeated Germany 6–4 in the semifinal before losing 5–4 to Sweden's Anna Hasselborg in the final. They closed out the first half of the season with a semifinal finish at the 2018 National and an undefeated run at the Schweizer Cup. In the new year, Pätz reached her first Slam final at the 2019 Canadian Open, however, lost to Rachel Homan. After winning the 2019 Swiss National Championships, the team represented Switzerland at the 2019 World Women's Curling Championship in Silkeborg, Denmark. The team went 2–3 in their first five games, then won six games in a row to secure their playoff spot. They went on to finish the round robin with an 8–4 record and in fourth place in the standings. They defeated China in the qualification game and South Korea in the semifinal to set up a repeat of the European Championship final against Hasselborg and Sweden. This time, the result was reversed, with Pätz making a draw to the four-foot in the extra end for an 8–7 win to claim her third World Championship. The team capped off their year by winning their first Grand Slam title at the 2019 Champions Cup and reaching the final of the inaugural Curling World Cup.
At the start of the 2019–20 season, Team Tirinzoni were runners-up at the 2019 Cameron's Brewing Oakville Fall Classic. They also qualified for the playoffs at their next three events, the Stu Sells Oakville Tankard, the 2019 AMJ Campbell Shorty Jenkins Classic and the 2019 WCT Uiseong International Curling Cup. The next week, they won the Women's Masters Basel. They again represented Switzerland at the 2019 European Curling Championships, where they finished the round robin in first place with an 8–1 record. However, they would not make the final, as they lost to Scotland's Eve Muirhead in the semifinal. They rebounded in the bronze medal game, defeating Alina Kovaleva of Russia. The team would not get to defend their title as world champions, losing the final of the 2020 Swiss Women's Curling Championship to the young Elena Stern rink. The Swiss championship would be the team's last event of the season, as both the Players' Championship and the Champions Cup Grand Slam events were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Team Tirinzoni began the 2020–21 season by making the final of the 2020 Schweizer Cup, where they once again lost to the Stern rink. Three weeks later, the team was invited to play in the Adelboden International men's World Curling Tour event, as a last-minute addition. After dropping their first game to Yannick Schwaller, they went on a four-game winning streak against the men's field before losing to Olympic bronze medallist Peter de Cruz in the semifinal. In the new year, Pätz won her fourth national championship at the 2021 Swiss Women's Curling Championship. This put her team in a playoff against 2020 Champions Team Stern for the right to represent Switzerland at the 2021 World Women's Curling Championship, as the 2020 Worlds were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Team Tirinzoni beat Stern in the playoff, and represented Switzerland at the World Championship, which was played in a bio-secure bubble in Calgary, Canada due to the pandemic. There, they finished with a 12–1 round robin record, including scoring a rare eight-ender against Denmark, the first time an eight-ender has ever been scored at a World Championship. In the playoffs, the team defeated the United States in the semifinal, and then Alina Kovaleva representing RCF (Russia) in the final to win the gold medal, successfully defending their 2019 championship. While also in the Calgary bubble, Team Tirinzoni played in two Grand Slam events, making the final at the 2021 Champions Cup and the semifinals at the 2021 Players' Championship.
Team Tirinzoni had a slow start to the 2021–22 season, not reaching any finals in their first five tour events. At the first two Slams, the 2021 Masters and the 2021 National, they went undefeated until losses in the quarterfinals and semifinals, respectively. At the 2021 European Curling Championships, the team failed to reach the playoffs for the first time, finishing in fifth with a 6–3 record. The next event the team played in was the 2022 Winter Olympics, where they found their footing for the first time during the season. They finished in first place after the preliminary round with an 8–1 round robin record. This earned them the top seed in the playoff round. They then, however, lost the semifinal to Japan's Satsuki Fujisawa and the bronze medal game to Sweden's Anna Hasselborg, placing fourth. Immediately after the Olympics, the team entered the Swiss Women's Curling Championship where they were once again able to defend their title, earning the right to represent Switzerland at the 2022 World Women's Curling Championship. At the championship, Team Tirinzoni dominated the competition, finishing the round robin with an unblemished 12–0 record. They then beat Sweden's Hasselborg in the semifinal to qualify once again for the world championship final where they would face South Korea's Kim Eun-jung. Switzerland took a three-point lead early, but Korea was able to tie the match later on. In the end, Pätz executed an open hit to win the match 7–6 and repeat for a third time as world women's curling champions. On 25 April the team announced that they would be splitting up at the end of the season, with front end Esther Neuenschwander and Melanie Barbezat stepping away from competitive curling. Team Tirinzoni ended their four-year run together with the final two Slam events of the season, the 2022 Players' Championship and the 2022 Champions Cup, where they had quarterfinal and semifinal finishes respectively. On 12 May Pätz and Tirinzoni announced that they would be staying together and adding Carole Howald and Briar Schwaller-Hürlimann to their team for the 2022–23 season.