US Nationals wrap-up and thoughts




Nationals certainly happened last week! Should it have...probably not! Considering how many athletes, not to mention likely support staff, coaches and audience members contracted the plague, it probably should've been cancelled. Especially since...it didn't seem to make much of a difference in who was selected. Let's look at the stats. 

Men's team
Nathan Chen, Vincent Zhou, Jason Brown

Women's team
Mariah Bell, Karen Chen, Alysa Liu

Ice Dance
Chock/Bates, Hubbell/Donohue, Hawayek/Baker

Pairs
Cain-Gribble/LeDuc, Knierim/Frazier

I would say the only thing that Nationals conceivably would have changed from the above teams is the 3rd dance team. If Green/Parsons had come in 3rd overall, it's possible they would've been selected over Hawayek/Baker. 

The men's team selection was controversial, but ultimately I really agree with the choice. Ilia Malinin has some of the best jumping technique I've ever seen and he has a bright future. But at the moment, he has no senior international experience and while he could do well Vincent has proven he is capable of winning a medal on the world stage. It's not a sure thing, but I'd put my money on Zhou over Malinin. Lot of folks were RILED up on Twitter that Zhou was too unpredictable and should be left off the team. I even read some tweets about how there was some kind of unofficial collusion to make sure he stayed ahead of Jason Brown. And even if that were true, it would still be true that he won a bronze medal at worlds and Malinin is a newbie with no experience. The 3 that are going deserve to be there. Malinin deserves it as well, but there's only 3 spots and sometimes that's how it goes.

As far as women's and pairs, I suppose it's conceivable that others could have been selected if they really performed well...but they didn't so. Great. 




That being said-I did really enjoy watching. I was (as always) really excited about the ice dance portion and surprised that H/D didn't have the RD which took them out of gold. But I have to say, I prefer both C/B's programs to H/D's. H/D's RD is just eh? I don't think this style of ice dance suits anyone. It wasn't cringey? So I guess that's something. And their FD is nice but the music. I'm sorry I hate the song choice. The vocals grate on me. I digress!

Should be exciting to see what goes down in Beijing. Stay tuned for medal predictions!

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