Alex Markland
Staff Writer
On Sunday, Feb. 22, the closing ceremonies marked the end of the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics, which was Team USA’s highest-performing winter games ever. In total, American athletes won 33 medals, including 12 golds, which was an all-time high for the country. Three of those medals came from figure skating events. The Americans took gold in the team figure skating event in the first week of the Games, and Madison Chock and Evan Bates won silver in Ice Dance, finishing after the French pair of Guillaume Cizeron and Laurence Fournier Beaudry. Gold medal favorite in Men’s Single Skating, Ilia Malinin, finished in 8th place when he fell twice in his free skate after leading the field in the short program. The defining moment of the Games for Team USA Figure Skating came on February 19, when 20-year-old Alysa Liu from the California Bay Area won gold for her performance in the free skate event.
Liu skyrocketed to stardom after her free skate performance. Her victory captivated the world and brought attention to her career-long story of resilience and commitment. Liu retired from skating at age 16, following her appearance at the 2022 Beijing Olympics, in which she finished sixth overall. Lieu attributed her retirement to feeling like skating was dominating her life and stopping her from living a normal childhood. She also said that she was satisfied with her career after her solid performance in Beijing. She took 18 months off before she announced her return on Instagram. The announcement featured a clip of Liu training with text reading “back on the ice” on March 1, 2024. After getting back into her training routine and rediscovering her passion for figure skating, Liu won the 2025 Figure Skating World Championships in Boston. She finished second in the singles event of the U.S. Championships in 2025 as well as 2026, which helped her qualify for Team USA prior to the Milan Olympics.
Liu’s gold in Italy was a monumental achievement, but she has downplayed its significance, saying, “These titles are huge, but I don’t want them to overshadow who I am and what I do and what I am all about … Winning isn’t all that, and neither is losing.” While Liu is staying humble following her victory, the country is hailing her as a superstar. Liu is the United States’ first Olympic Champion in individual women’s figure skating since Sarah Hughes won gold at the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City, UT. Streams of Donna Summer’s 1978 disco cover of “MacArthur Park,” which Liu skated to in her gold medal-clinching free skate, rose by 505% in the U.S. on Thursday.
The overall Olympic women’s figure skating scene saw Japanese skaters taking home both the silver and the bronze in Milan. Kaori Sakamoto won silver and announced that she would retire after the Olympics, and Ami Nakai won bronze at the age of 17. Nakai, fourth place finisher Mone Chiba and American Amber Glenn, who finished in fifth, will look to the 2030 Olympics in the French Alps for their next chance at Olympic Gold.
https://www.nbcolympics.com/news/alysa-liu-champion-who-cant-stop-smiling