Thursday, February 19, 2026

Gonna be, gonna be golden.

The US women bring home some heavy metal.

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• We open tonight with the best. THE BEST! Did you watch the Women's Hockey gold medal game this afternoon? The US trailed Canada 1-0 for most of the game. With a little over two minutes left, the Americans pulled their goalie, desperate to score. And they did! Overtime! Sudden death Olympic overtime! Then four minutes later USA’s Megan Keller did the killing. More on this later, says Mike.
• Right to figure skating we go, with Amber Glenn leading off the night since she finished in – bleah – 13th place after the short program. But now all the pressure should be off of her, so she'll probably be the best skater we see in this segment. And how does she look? Amazing. Well, until the last jump. She puts a hand down. But she didn't fall. And honestly, with this performance she'll probably end up in first place until the final group of six skates. She's visibly relieved. And she's in first place by a good margin.
• Niina Petrokina of Estonia skates to music from Dune. Is she a superhuman like the Bene Gesserit? Nope. She controls neither the spice nor the leaderboard.
• Korea's Lee Hae-in will be channeling her inner Katarina Witt and skating to Carmen. The East German judge might give her a good score, but she still doesn't pass Glenn.
• Next up is Isabeau Levito, starting from eighth place. Eek. She falls on her first jump. But the rest of her routine is very elegant. Tara says every time she takes the ice she casts a spell over the audience. Maybe SHE is the Bene Gesserit! But her spells can't get her on the medal stand.
• And now it's time for a full recap of the Women's Hockey gold medal game. Canada struck first, scoring a short-handed goal at the beginning of the second period to take the lead. All through the rest of the second period and 18 minutes of the third period, the US couldn't score. So with about two minutes left they pulled the goalie to get a 6-on-5 against the Canadians. And it worked! The US tied it up and took the game to overtime, where the teams went three-on-three. And just four minutes later, Megan Keller did a little juke move and knocked in the winning goal. The US team goes nuts, because they just won the gold. Canada is shocked. I know the feeling. I’ve seen something like this before.
• Medal ceremony! Does Team USA sing? Boy, do they! They sing, they stand arm-in-arm swaying back-and-forth, they smile, and the entire crowd sings with them. It's the best. THE BEST!
• It's speed skating time with the Men's 1500M race, and Jordan Stolz is going for his third gold. But we start with American Emery Lehman, who was in yesterday's Team Pursuit event. He's not fast enough by himself. The next American is Casey Dawson, also on the Team Pursuit team. He, too, can't make it.
• Joep Weenemars of the Netherlands sets an Olympic record on his race, and we're not even to the fast racers yet. Kjeld Nuis, the current world record holder who is also from the Netherlands, doesn't beat the Olympic record, but the man he's racing against, Ning Zhongyan of China, does.
• The last pair is Jordan Stolz facing off against Norway's Peder Kongshaug. If Jordan wins, he'll be second only to Eric Heiden in speed skating gold medals by an American. Well, he's fast, but not Olympic record fast. Jordan gets silver.
• Back at figure skating, Tara has killed a mirror ball and is now wearing its skin as a dress. Johnny has plucked a golden bird of its feathers and used them to adorn his outfit. Terry is wearing a suit.
• We start the final round with Georgia's Anastasiia Gubanova. She'll start her routine in sixth, so she'll be the first person with a realistic shot at passing Amber. She looked good, but she must have skipped something, because near the end of the routine the scoreboard showed a 0.00 on the score. Nope. Fourth place. No medal for her.
• Fluff time! The skaters watch some home movies while Tara narrates. Yawn.
• Next up is the skater from Individual Neutral Athleteland, Adeliya Petrosian. The not-officially-Russian skater falls at the beginning but otherwise does well. Johnny thinks she makes things look hard, whereas judges like it when skaters make things look easy. She moves into second, BUT that means that Amber Glenn is still first with only four skaters to go. Is it possible that Glenn could still medal?
• Japan's Mone Chiba is next. She skates a very clean routine. I don't know if there was anything spectacular here, but she started out with a lead over Glenn, and I'm guessing she'll probably pass her to move into first. Yep! She's our new leader.
• Alysa Liu gets some fluff. She doesn't take skating as seriously as other people. She has friends and a life outside of skating. She won a national championship at age 13, but then when she went to Beijing at age 16, she underperformed and didn't like skating anymore. So she retired. At 16. Can you call it retirement at 16? Anyway, she went on vacation, went to concerts, got a drivers license… you know, normal things. But she went skiing in 2024 and felt competitive again, so she got back into skating. A year later she won a world championship. And now she loves skating again and is at peace. Fluff, but interesting.
• Alysa was in third place after the short program, and she looks very happy going onto the ice. She's noticeably more relaxed than any other skater has looked tonight. Remember when Petrosian was skating and Johnny said she made things look hard? Liu is making this look like the easiest thing in the world. Everyone else looked like they were competing. Liu looks like she is just showing off. If this doesn't move her into first I'm not going to watch any more skating because if that's the case I obviously don't understand anything about it. Wow! Not just a lead, a BIG lead. That's a minimum of bronze for Alysa, and now the pressure is on the last two skaters.
• Next up is Kaori Sakamoto of Japan. She was second in the short program. She's good. Tara said she missed something, but I couldn’t tell you what it was. Her technical score isn't as high as Liu's was. I don't know how far ahead Sakamoto was, but I think it's going to be close. Both Johnny and Tara think Alysa will stay in first. Kaori looks upset in kiss-and-cry so she must think that, too. They're all correct. Sakamoto is now in second. That knocks Amber Glenn off the medal stand.
• Last up, the short program leader, 17-year-old Ami Nakai. Tara says if she skates clean she'll probably win gold. She pulls out of one jump. Johnny says she needs to hit everything else. And she does. Her technical score is a quarter-point higher than Alysa's. This is going to be close. Tara thinks Alysa. Terry doesn't know. Johnny thinks Alysa. But none of them are sure. But regardless, this will be the first American medal since 2006. Wow! She wasn't even close. Nakai ends up in third, which means Alysa Liu is your new Olympic champion, the first US women's skating gold since 2002.
• Skimo! That's Ski Mountaineering, a new sport. You ski up a hill through obstacles, take off the skis, run up a staircase, then ski down. This sounds like something the Swedes and Norwegians made up so they could win more medals. But if that's the case they failed, since Switzerland and Spain won the first two medals.
• Medal count time! The US in now in second with nine golds and 27 medals overall. Who is leading? Norway. Duh.
• Alysa is with Mike in the studio. What did she notice in rewatching her routine? She thought she did well. Duh! She got gold! She just said she enjoyed everything about her night, from the performance to taking pictures before the event started. I've rarely seen an athlete that relaxed, so I believe it.
• And now it's time for her medal ceremony. Will Alysa sing? Not until “home of the brave,” but she does. Better late than never, Alysa! Interestingly, Kaori Sakamoto was crying. Because she's proud she got second or upset that she didn't get first? We'll never know!

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The women's hockey was fantastic today. For almost 38 minutes I thought the US was going to lose. Then they miraculously tied it, then miraculously won. It was a nailbiter of an afternoon. Alysa on the other hand, was calm and relaxed and made you feel calm and relaxed. You know, "it's just me, casually skating a perfect performance and winning a gold medal. No big deal." It is a pretty big deal, Alysa. Congratulations! See you tomorrow!

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