Accepted by Yale, world champion Nathan Chen faces big decisions

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Accepted by Yale, world champion Nathan Chen faces big decisions

Talk about your happy coincidences and good omens.

Nathan Chen swings through Hartford with Stars on Ice on Sunday, April 22, before the tour has four nights off.

Bulldog Days, the three-day information session for newly admitted Yale students, begins April 23 in New Haven -- just 40 miles away from the Connecticut capital.

So Chen will be in the right place at the right time to speak to the right people at Yale about how -- and if -- he can begin his college career with the 2018 fall semester and simultaneously continue as a competitive figure skater.

"Going to Yale next fall is the goal right now," Chen said via telephone Tuesday morning from Fort Myers, Florida, where he is rehearsing for the Stars on Ice opening show Friday night. "I am going to Bulldog Days, where I will talk about everything and try to figure things out."

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Breathtaking Olympic performances highlighted figure skating season

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Breathtaking Olympic performances highlighted figure skating season

Some random observations on the competitive figure skating season that ended last week at the World Championships in Milan:

1.  The enduring memory will be of the overall excellence at the 2018 Olympics – the best skating in all four disciplines at the 11 Winter Games I have covered.

The full flowering of the quad revolution led to boggling feats in the men’s event, where Japan’s peerless Yuzuru Hanyu won a second straight Olympic title with a balance between athleticism and art unmatched by any man during the 14-seasons the IJS has been used at global championships.

Russians Alina Zagitova and Evgenia Medvedeva were flawlessly stunning in taking gold and silver, respectively, in the women’s event, and Canada’s Kaetlyn Osmond won bronze with her huge jumps, expressiveness and sense of choreographic purpose erasing one relatively minor mistake.

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Figure skating worlds in Olympic year? I say no

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Figure skating worlds in Olympic year? I say no

With the 2018 World Figure Skating Championships set to begin this week in Milan, Italy, icenetwork contributors Lynn Rutherford and Philip Hersh weigh the pros and cons of having the world championships take place during an Olympic season.

Why the World Championships in the Olympic year should be eliminated

*They are a massive anti-climax. Other sports get that. Of the 15 Winter Olympic sports, only hockey, curling and speed skating still have world championships in the Olympic year -- but long track speed skating does not have World Single Distance, its global championship that follows the Olympic format. Hockey's format includes more and different teams and a different pool of athletes (NHL players whose teams are out of playoffs.)

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Bouquets, brickbats (and some of both): a 2018 Olympic figure skating scorecard

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Bouquets, brickbats (and some of both): a 2018 Olympic figure skating scorecard

Lynn Rutherford and I checked in with our winners and losers from the figure skating competition at the recently completed 2018 Olympic Winter Games.

Some of my winners:

Eteri Tutberidze

Although early records are incomplete, the coach of Alina Zagitova and Evgenia Medvedeva is almost certainly the first person to be by the boards for both the gold and silver medalists in an Olympic singles event.

Skate Canada

The best possible realistic scenario for the Canadians was two gold and two bronze medals, and that is exactly what their skaters won -- and they were on the podium in four of the five events. No other country medaled in more than two.

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In the "little war" between top Russian women skaters, generation next - Alina Zagitova - wins first skirmish at Olympics

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In the "little war" between top Russian women skaters, generation next - Alina Zagitova - wins first skirmish at Olympics

GANGNEUNG, South Korea - Last year, the Russian television network RT did an illuminating documentary on how coach Eteri Tutberidze trains her two enormously talented skaters, Evgenia Medvedeva and Alina Zagitova, and on the relationship between the two teenagers.

At one moment in the 26-minute film, Medvedeva talked about keeping up with the burgeoning technical abilities of the many younger girls whom Tutberidze and her assistants also coach at the Crystal Rink in southwest Moscow.

"I don't want to lag behind the younger generation," Medvedeva said.

Then she laughed about the irony in her words.

"I'm 17, and I'm talking about the younger generation," she added. "Isn't that terrible?"

It is even more ironic that one skater in that generation may have arrived so soon she may take the 2018 Olympic gold medal away from Medvedeva, now 18, winner of the last two world titles.

That would be Zagitova, 15, who beat Medvedeva in a game of "Can you top this?" during the ladies short program Wednesday at the Gangneung Ice Arena.

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