JAPAN’S HANYU MATCHES BUTTON
KOREA» Move GANGNEUNG, SOUTH over, Dick Button. You have company atop the Olympic men’s figure skating pantheon: Japan’s Yuzuru Hanyu.
Hanyu became the first man to successfully defend his Olympic title since Button in 1952. He held off countryman Shoma Uno and Spain’s Javier Fernandez in Saturday’s free skate.
Fernandez shares the same coach, Brian Orser, with Hanyu. Orser rushed to greet Hanyu as he left the ice after his strong but slightly flawed performance. Then Orser, a two-time Olympic silver medalist, rushed to behind the sideboards to help encourage Fernandez during his skate.
American Nathan Chen surged from a fiasco of a short program, when he was 17th, by winning the free skate after landing an unparalleled six quadruple jumps to wind up fifth overall.
Super Dario wins more gold.
Switzerland’s Dario Cologna has solidified his legacy as one of the best distance cross country skiers of all time.
Cologna, known throughout his sport as “Super Dario,” became the first cross country skier to win three Olympic gold medals in the same event, capturing the 15-kilometer freestyle in dominating fashion Friday. He also won this race at Vancouver in 2010 and at Sochi in 2014.
Cologna’s three-peat gave Switzerland its first gold medal of the PyeongChang Games.
Cologna won the race in 33 minutes, 43.9 seconds, more than 18 seconds ahead of Simen Hegstad Krueger from Norway.
Denis Spitsov of Russia finished in third place.
Tongan cross country skier Pita Taufatofua, best known for participating in the last two Olympic opening ceremonies without wearing a shirt, finished 114th among 119 competitors.
More Dutch speedskating gold.
GANGNEUNG, SOUTH
In a battle of youth against experience, rookie Esmee Visser came out on top and gave the Netherlands yet another gold medal in speedskating.
The 22-year-old Visser won the 5,000 meters, while 45-yearold Claudia Pechstein faded and fell short of a fourth gold over the distance.
Two-time defending champion Martina Sablikova, who has been troubled by a bad back, gave Visser the toughest challenge until the final lap, settling for silver ahead of Russian skater Natalia Voronina.
Pechstein, who had won three titles over the distance and was still in great form this season, was seeking to become the oldest woman to win a Winter Olympic title. But she faded to eighth place, 15.20 seconds behind Visser.
Belarus strikes gold again.
Hanna Huskova gave Belarus its second gold medal in women’s aerials.
The 25-year-old narrowly defeated China’s Zhang Xin in a windy finals. Huskova posted a score of 96.14 in the final round of jumping, just ahead of Zhang’s 95.52.
China’s Kong Fanyu took bronze in a sloppy last round. Huskova and Zhang were the only two women in the sixperson final to land their jumps cleanly.
Footnotes.
University of Denver hockey player Troy Terry and Ryan Donato were instrumental in helping Team USA secure an important 2-1 victory over Slovakia in the preliminary round. Donato scored two power-play goals and Terry dominated with his speed. They are two of the four NCAA players on the noNHL Olympic roster. … NBC had its roughest night of the Olympics on Thursday. The total of 19.3 million people who watched the Games on NBC, NBCSN or streaming services in prime time Thursday was down 16 percent from NBC’s 22.9 million viewers at Sochi four years ago. On NBC alone, the viewership of 16.2 million represented a 29 percent drop, the Nielsen company said. NBCSN, which aired the entirety of the skating program, had its biggest audience of the Olympics with 2.75 million.