Alexa Scimeca & Chris Knierim (USA), upset the applecart with a first place over the three-time World Junior champions and the 2014 Olympic silver medalists. They are the first American team since 2006 to win the Skate America short program.

Long a technically proficient team, after Nebelhorn Trophy, the team has focused on taking their program to a higher level, by concentrating more on expressing more emotion and fire in their performances.

“We are very proud of ourselves and happy with the way we skated. Since our last event at Nebelhorn (Trophy), we have taken this program and took the choreography and basically started from scratch and rebuilt the emotion and fire that needs to be brought when we skate it. It’s been a hard three weeks since Nebelhorn, because we’ve been working so hard in the mirror on expression and tension within the movements and if felt really great to bring it today. I think we made everybody in the audience feel something and that was the goal," explained Scimeca.

Skating to "Nothing Else Matters" by Metallica, the team had a strong skate, with only a poor landing on triple Salchow by Knierim.

Knierim described their choice of music saying, "Every year we’re planning on kind of changing up the music for short and long to different types to see what we like the best for the 2018 (Olympic) season, so this was just another change-up that we really liked that we picked before the last season was over, just to see how our skating can grow with the different music. When we first started competing Nebelhorn and before that, it was something we kind of struggled with at the beginning. After Nebelhorn we kind of revised the program, put in a different feel and it’s finally become more comfortable."

Scimeca added, "The music is put together from three different versions and the first half of the program is a softer side so we were trying to channel a more romantic side, a little more graceful to suit the slower music, but most of the feedback we received was throughout each showing was that they wanted more and it wasn’t enough. We talked about, what can we do to change this, to make people feel something, and it was channelling the second half the program in the first part as well. That’s just being stronger, more fierce, having more tension in our movements. One reason we chose this music is because of the lyrics, they mean a lot to us.

One tool the team uses to project the passion and tension they are seeking is through Scimeca's facial expressions, which a times border on over the top intensity.

Explaining her approach to this, Sciemca said, "First of all figure skating is a performance sport, so you need to tell a story, you need to act and you need to perform the whole time. This program wouldn’t be a performance with a casual, normal face. If you watch rockers sing and perform, they go all out. Luckily I have a comfort in doing that because I’m an outgoing person. I think it’s a wonderful quality in our team because it’s pulled Chris out of his comfort zone. Now we’re in a different tier as far as our expression and it sets us apart from other performances because you remember it, you talk about it. If people think it’s too much, I’d rather have too much than not enough."

Two Chinese teams rounded out the top three places with  Wenjing Sui & Cong Han scored second and Xuhan Wang & Lei Wang were scored third.

Describing their performance Sui said, "This is the first time for us to compete internationally [this season]. Today our performance wasn’t the best from our experience, but tomorrow we are going to try harder in the free skate to put out the best quality performance.'

The team completed a superby throw triple flip that received eight threes for GoEs.  But on their pair spin, Han stumbled and the element was called base value, below short program requirements.  It received no points, which cost them the lead in the short program.

Wang & Wang outscored their countryman in elements points but trailed in components to end up third in the short.

"I’m very happy to come here to the United States and these days I feel very good," said Xuehan. "I feel today my performance is normal and had a good quality. I’m happy to here."  Her partner added, "This is our first time together here in the U.S. and in terms of our preparation, we have to adjust for the time zone and we are very sleepy these days. On the way here, I keep asking myself whether I’m sleeping or whether I’m awake. But thanks to my coach and partner, I thought our performance was good and had a reasonably good quality."

Julianne Seguin & Charlie Bilodeau (CAN), reigning World Junior silver medalists, were fourth in their Grand Prix debut.  They skated a lively program to "Monde Inverse" from Cirque du Soliel.

Ksenia Stolbova & Fedor Klimov (RUS), the current European and 2014 Olympic champions faltered on several elements and finished fifth.  The team executed a poor catch on their twist lift, and had a fall on the throw triple flip.  Stolbova also stumbled on their step sequence.  Skating to "I Put a Spell on You," the team scored highest in program components.  Keeping them in the running in terms of points going into the long program.