Evgeni Plushenko (RUS)

Team Standings Final Standings

(9 February 2014)  Team Russia ran away with the Team Event in the last of three days of competition.  The five teams that advanced to the final round competed in the Men's and Ladies Free Skates and the Ice Dance Free Dance on this third and last day of Team competition.  Team Canada held on for the silver medal and Team USA won the bronze.

In the Men's Free Skate segment, Paul Bonifacio Parkinson led off with a wild and sloppy performance to music by Queen.  He fell on a quad Salchow attempt and also a triple Axel.  He landed another triple Axel attempt, in combination with double toe loop, but for most of the routine brought to mind the image of a penguin on skates.

Jason Brown from Team USA gave a credible performance in his first Olympic appearance.  He was one of Team USA's two allowed substitutions, replacing Jeremy Abbott who was a disaster in the Men's Short Program.  Brown landed two triple Axels, though the second solo attempt was under-rotated.  He also under-rotated a triple Salchow in a three jump combination.  He landed a total of eight triples, including the two that were called under -rotated.  He did not attempt a quad.  His performance was well received and scored an average of 7.92 in components.

Team Canada also made one of their permitted substitutions for the Men's Free Skate, using Kevin Reynolds in the free skate instead of Patrick Chan.  Some observers took this substitution to mean that Canada was now serious about winning the Team Event; but in reality, even if Chan had skated and won the segment, Team Canada would still have missed out on the gold by five points.

Reynolds had only one significant error in an otherwise clean program, stepping out of a triple Axel.  He landed three quads cleanly.  His performance started out strong, but slowed in the second half, with the choreography and interpretation wandering into the land of boring.

The segment was won by Team Russia's Evgeni Plushenko.  He landed an opening solo quad toe loop and five subsequent triple jumps.  He was scored third in Total Element Score, and won the segment by being over-marked in program components, particularly in Transitions.  More judges than in the short program had the courage to mark him down on transitions, but two judges were still hallucinating and gave scores of 9.00 and 9.25 for Transitions.  The routine was a medley of Plushenko "greatest hits" that had no identifiable purpose or continuity.  Between now and the Men's event later this week, someone in the ISU needs to talk to the Men's panel and urge them to judge what they see on the ice and not what they fanaticize they see on the ice.

On his performance he said, "I am happy of course with my performance and that of the team.  I tried my best in both the short program and the long program.  I think today I would give myself a 4+ (equivalent to B+). ... In principle I did everything I planned to with the exception of two jumps (the triple Salchows).  This means everything to me.  I did the quad.  I did two triple Axels and two triple Lutzes/  I got 10 points and now I cross my fingers for a gold medal."  On the Salchows he also said, "I felt a pain in my back after the first Salchow, that is maybe why I made the mistakes and did doubles."

There had been speculation coming in to the games, that Plushenko would withdraw after the Team Event and allow Maxim Kovtun to compete in the individual event.  On the individual event he said, "I'm going to compete.  I want to skate.  I want to skate my best performance.  I'm going to try two quads.  Today is just a warm up.  I'm not skating with Yuzu or with Patrick Chan so we decided on no quad today but just to skate clean."

Last to skate was Tatsuki Machida, who Team Japan substituted for Yuzuru Hanyo.  Skating to "Firebird," Machida landed an opening quad toe loop, and then tripled his attempt at a second quad.  He two footed the landing of the triple, the only significant error in thee elements.  He landed a total of one quad and seven triples.  He started with good speed and a nice interpretation, but in the last third he slowed significantly to get through it alive.  He placed third in the segment.

The men were followed by the Ladies Free Skate - a segment that was all about Julia Lipnitskaya who dominated the group.  She gave a season best performance, to win the segment by 12.13.  She landed seven triple jumps, including a Lutz-toe triple-triple combination.  Her second triple Lutz had an edge call, the only significant technical error of the program.  Her performance was strong and mature, skating to music from "Schindler's List."  With her two performances in the Team Event, Lipnitskaya has propelled herself into the ranks of a top contender for the Ladies event.

Afterwards she said, "I don't know how to explain the feeling I had out there. I'm very happy to have helped win the first gold medal for Russia.  I got nervous in the middle of the program.  I'm not sure why.  It's completely unlike me, so the jumps weren't great in the second half.  I didn't feel totally comfortable.  The jumps didn't feel like mine at that point.  I wouldn't say I got tired, but some errors crept in.  But even with some flaws it was OK.  I'm happy with my marks, the scores overall, for the team and for all of Russia.  I am so pleased all the country could help me."

Gracie Gold skated the segment for Team USA as a substitute for Ashley Wagner.  She earned a season's best 129.38 score with seven triple jumps.  Like Lipnitskaya she had an edge call on one jump, a triple flip, and also executed a clean triple-triple. )Lutz-toe loop).  She trailed Lipinitskaya by 4.2 points in Technical Element score and 7.93 in Program Component Score.  Both Lipinitskaya and Gold have become media darlings in the last few days, with some even hyping Gold for the gold, but the best she can realistically hope for is a shot at the bronze if a few skaters ahead of her fall down along the way.  Her elegant performance to "The Sleeping Beauty" earned component marks that averaged 7.64, well below the marks we anticipate for the Ladies medalists.

Team Italy's Valentina Marchei just edged out Japan's Akiko Suzuki by 0.18 points, a significant result in allowing Team Italy to best Team Japan by one point in the final standings.  Suzuki skated an artistically superior program, scoring ahead of Marchei in components, but was a technical mess with four jump elements having under-rotations or downgrades, and one an edge call.  Marchei was technically cleaner, with only one under-rotation and one edge call.

Kaetlyn Osmond was the caboose in the Ladies Free Skate, with 110.73 point sin a performance with several minor technical issues and a lackluster performance.

The last segment to be contested in the Team Event was the Dance Free Dance.  Meryl Davis & Charlie White again bested their rivals Tess Virtue & Scott Moir.  This time by 6.78 points.  It was a season best performance for Davis & White, and significantly less than season best for Virtue & Moir.  The same panel will judge the Dance event as did the team dance segments, so Virtue & Moir appear to be toast in the individual event.  For both segments, Davis & White crushed Virtue and Moir by a total of 9.78.  One significant factor in the free dance scores was Virtue & Moir losing 3 points on their diagonal step sequence which was called level 2 versus level 4 achieved by Davis & White.

Commenting on their performance Moir said, "It was a good skate, but the levels weren't where they needed to be.  We skated strong and we put in a lot of hard work, so we're happy to bring home a medal for Canada. ... Five or five and a half points are on the technical side and we can work on that."  He added, " We're happy with our performance. It's a very demanding program but we're still building on it.  Up until now, I've only thought about the team, but now it's time to move forward.  It's about the individual event now.  That's where my mind is now.  We're going to keep building.

Virtue wore a red dress in the Team segment, about which she explained, "We wanted to make a statement.  We're performing this program twice and I wanted two dresses.  I think this one works for the end of the program and the one I'll wear next time works for the beginning of the program because it's pastel.  The designer of this dress studies Russian embroidery and in fact this dress was designed after a Faberge egg."

Third place in the free dance segment was taken by Team Russia's Elena Ilinykh & Nikita Katsalapov, a substitution from the Short Dance.  They received a 1 point Costume Failure deduction (meaning something from their costume fell on the ice).

With first or second place finishes in six of the eight segments, and third place finishes in the other two, Team Russia dominated the Team event with 75 of 80 points to win the gold medal.  Team Canada ended second with 65 of 80 points, and Team USA third with 60 of 80 possible points.  Team USA led Team Canada in the Ladies and Dance segments, while Canada led in Men and Pairs.

Following the competition there was a flower ceremony in which the athletes received congratulations and flowers on podiums, but not their medals.  Beginning with this Olympics, the figure skating medalists will now receive their medals in an awards ceremony in the Olympic Park plaza, like the athletes from the other sports, and not in the competition venue.

Russian Federation President Vladimir Putin was on hand for the competition this evening and personally congratulated the Russian team after the flower ceremony.