Ilia Malinin stunned by Yuma Kagiyama in Olympic figure skating short program

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Ilia Malinin's quest for Olympic figure skating golden mightiness not beryllium truthful casual aft all. The aforesaid goes for his American team.

Yuma Kagiyama landed a brace of near-perfect quads, 1 successful operation with a triple toed loop, and the Japanese prima scored 108.67 points for his abbreviated programme Saturday night. That topped Malinin successful the conception — helium was 2nd with 98.00 — and gave his squad 33 points, conscionable 1 down the defending champion U.S. astatine the midway juncture of the three-day competition.

While helium waited for his score, his Team USA colleagues rallied down him, waving and covering him with the American flag.

"I conscionable felt excited to beryllium here. Come on, this is the Olympics. You're talking similar this is simply a atrocious thing," said Malinin, the two-time reigning satellite champion who is unbeaten successful his past 14 completed competitions stretching backmost much than 2 years.

"It's conscionable truthful awesome to beryllium present and beryllium a portion of this team," Malinin said. "It's honestly a beingness achievement."

Italy was 3rd successful the squad lawsuit with 28 points, Canada 4th with 27 and Georgia 5th with 25.

Only the apical 5 precocious aft the abbreviated program, and the Canadians squeaked done acknowledgment to Stephen Gogolev's personal-best 92.99 score. Kevin Aymoz was incapable to lucifer him for France, leaving his squad 1 constituent beneath the chopped line.

The 2nd fractional of the squad lawsuit began aboriginal Saturday nighttime with the escaped dance, wherever satellite champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates were backmost for the U.S. They won the rhythm dance connected Friday, hours earlier the opening ceremony, giving the Americans the max of 10 points and plentifulness of momentum to statesman the multi-discipline event.

Now, it's the Japanese with the momentum.

"I didn't consciousness the unit and I didn't consciousness tense today," Kagiyama said. "I'm precise blessed our people is truthful adjacent to the USA."

Before making his Olympic debut, Malinin had stalked done the tunnels wrong Milano Ice Skating Arena, wearing a achromatic vessel apical that work "Quad God," the nickname reflective of the mode helium performs those other-worldly four-revolution jumps.

The sanction came astir erstwhile helium tried changing his Instagram handle.

"I was like, 'Oh, I landed a quad? Quad God, determination it is, okay, let's enactment it in,'" he told CBS News successful an interrogation past week. "And from determination everyone's like, 'Why'd you sanction yourself Quad God? You lone person 1 quad." And I'm like, 'Well, present that I deliberation astir it, possibly I should effort to onshore each of them to get the Quad God status.'"

The 21-year-old wunderkind did not effort the quad axel — the 4 1/2-revolution leap lone helium has ever landed successful contention — but did a shaky mentation of the triple instead. He had started with a superb opening quad flip and finished his programme with a quad lutz-triple toed loop, getting bonus points for the operation due to the fact that it came successful the 2nd fractional of the program.

But erstwhile his people was read, Malinin seemed astir stunned that Kagiyama had beaten him — and by the margin.

"That's lone 50% of my afloat imaginable here," Malinin said.

Malinan, whose parents were Olympic fig skaters for Uzbekistan and whose gramps was a fig skater for the USSR, started skating astatine 6.

He won golden astatine some the 2024 and 2025 ISU Figure Skating World Championships.

Kagiyama opened with a quad toe-triple toed combination, landed a quad salchow and finished his abbreviated programme with a peerless triple axel. And dissimilar Malinin, erstwhile Kagiyama's people was read, helium jumped retired of his spot with clenched fists raised high.

"I ever person bully information from Ilia due to the fact that helium is 1 of the skaters who created this fig skating moment," Kagiyama said. "He's a bully jumper, and helium tin bash quads, truthful I ever deliberation that I privation to drawback him."

The Americans person been connected a ngo ever since the 2022 Beijing Games, wherever their Olympic triumph was overshadowed by a Russian doping controversy. The ensuing probe held their golden medals successful limbo for much than 2 years, until Chock and Bates were portion of the squad that yet received them successful a ceremonial during the 2024 Summer Olympics successful Paris.

Japan has agelong been considered their biggest rivals. And they person lived up to those expectations, getting abbreviated programs by Kaori Sakamoto and pairs satellite champions Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara to spell with Kagiyama's triumph Saturday night.

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