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MILAN (AP) — Alysa Liu is left to carry the hopes of the “Blade Angels” into the women’s free skate at the Milan Cortina Olympics.
The reigning world champion was the only one of American’s vaunted figure skating trio to put herself in contention for gold after the short program on Tuesday night. Liu landed a triple lutz-triple loop, the hardest combination that any woman attempted, and sat only two points back of leader Ami Nakai and right behind her Japanese teammate Kaori Sakamoto on the leaderboard.
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“I am really happy about how I skated,” Liu said, “and my siblings, my best friends and a ton of my family is out there. And I saw them on the warmup. I also saw them during my program, so, I don’t know. It was a really cool moment, because they never come to watch like this. I’m really glad I did super well. I felt super grounded and I connected with my program on another level.”
Things didn’t go nearly as well for the rest of the American team Tuesday night.
Isabeau Levito was dinged for under-rotating her triple loop and got leveled down for her step sequence, which is where she tends to pick up points on the competition. It left her in eighth place and a long shot to climb her way onto the podium Thursday night.
Amber Glenn, the three-time reigning U.S. champion, was right in the medal mix until her final jump.
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After landing a huge opening triple axel — Glenn and Nakai were the only ones in the women’s field to attempt the 3 1/2-revolution jump — she kept the momentum going with a triple flip-triple toe loop. But something seemed amiss as Glenn approached a triple loop, and she wound up bailing out of it. The resulting double loop became an invalid element and earned her no points.
The lost points on the jump, somewhere in the range of seven or eight, took away any chance of being a medal contender.
“I had it,” Glenn told her coach, Damon Allen, as she tried to hold back the tears stepping off the ice.
“It’s not over,” he replied, giving her a hug.
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It certainly was not the way Glenn wanted to end a night that began with the euphoria of a message…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/alysa-liu-surges-medal-range-222955573.html
Author : DAVE SKRETTA
Publish date : 2026-02-17 22:29:00
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