Assessing the Grand Prix figure skating season at the halfway point

By Nick ZaccardiNov 8, 2016, 3:16 PM EST

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The Grand Prix figure skating season — whose results are the best indicators of favorites for national and world championships — is at its midpoint.

Skate America, Skate Canada and Rostelecom Cup are behind us. Trophée de France, Cup of China and NHK Trophy are ahead, followed by the Grand Prix Final (six skaters per discipline) in December.

The U.S. Championships are in January, followed by the world championships in Helsinki in late March and early April.

With the Olympics a 15 months away, jockeying for position this season is more important than the previous two. Here is where things stand for each discipline:

MEN
Top Grand Prix Scores
1. Javier Fernandez (ESP) — 292.98 (Rostelecom Cup)
2. Shoma Uno (JPN) — 285.07 (Rostelecom Cup)
3. Shoma Uno (JPN) — 279.34 (Skate America)
4. Jason Brown (USA) — 268.38 (Skate America)
5. Patrick Chan (CAN) — 266.95 (Skate Canada)
6. Yuzuru Hanyu (JPN) — 263.06 (Skate Canada)
7. Adam Rippon (USA) — 261.43 (Skate America)

Top U.S. Grand Prix Scores
1. Jason Brown — 268.38 (Skate America)
2. Adam Rippon— 261.43 (Skate America)
3. Max Aaron — 235.58 (Rostelecom Cup)
4. Timothy Dolensky — 226.53 (Rostelecom Cup)
5. Grant Hochstein — 204.69 (Skate Canada)

What’s remarkable here is the progression in scores in the last three seasons. Two years ago, the top men’s score after the third Grand Prix was 269.09. Last year, it was 271.14.

Uno was the best skater in September and October, winning all three of his events, but Fernandez looked more like a world champion in his debut last weekend. The Olympic champion Hanyu is a notoriously slow starter. His Skate Canada score was actually higher than his Grand Prix debuts in 2014 and 2015.

We’ll have a better sense of the American picture after Nathan Chen makes his Grand Prix season debut in France this week. Chen, 17 and the youngest man to finish top three at the U.S. Championships since 1973, beat Patrick Chan at a lower-level event in October.

WOMEN
Top Grand Prix Scores
1. Yevgenia Medvedeva (RUS) — 220.65 (Skate Canada)
2. Anna Pogorilaya (RUS) — 215.21 (Rostelecom Cup)
3. Kaetlyn Osmond (CAN) — 206.45 (Skate Canada)
4. Ashley Wagner (USA) — 196.44 (Skate America)
5. Yelena Radionova (RUS) — 195.60 (Rostelecom Cup)
6. Satoko Miyahara (JPN) — 192.08 (Skate Canada)
7. Mariah Bell (USA) — 191.49 (Skate America)

Top U.S. Grand Prix Scores
1. Ashley Wagner — 196.44 (Skate America)
2. Mariah Bell — 191.49 (Skate America)
3. Gracie Gold — 184.22 (Skate America)
4. Courtney Hicks — 182.98 (Rostelecom Cup)
5. Mirai Nagasu — 151.42 (Skate Canada)

Medvedeva hasn’t lost in one year and seems unlikely to follow the trend of recent Russian stars who flamed out after one strong season (2015 World champion Elizaveta Tuktamysheva, 2014 Olympic champions Yulia Lipnitskaya and Adelina Sotnikova). She picked up at Skate Canada right where she left off at the world championships last season.

Wagner and Pogorilaya, who joined Medvedeva on the worlds podium last April, won the other two Grand Prix events in the first half. The surprise has been Osmond, who tacked 30 points onto her personal-best total score in this her fourth season of international competition.

Wagner is still the class of the U.S. group, in part because Gold is off to a slow start (fifth at Skate America) after taking much of the summer off from training. U.S. silver medalist Polina Edmunds isn’t competing in the Grand Prix season due to a foot injury. If Gold or Edmunds is not back and in top form at the U.S. Championships in January, Bell is looking like the most promising riser in several years.

Pairs
Top Grand Prix Scores
1. Meagan Duhamel/Eric Radford (CAN) — 218.30 (Skate Canada)
2. Aliona Savchenko/Bruno Massot (GER) — 207.89 (Rostelecom Cup)
3. Yu Xiaoyu/Zhang Hao (CHN) — 202.08 (Skate Canada)
4. Natalya Zabiyako/Alexander Enbert (RUS) — 197.77 (Rostelecom Cup)
5. Julianne Séguin/Charlie Bilodeau (CAN) — 197.31 (Skate America)
6. Haven Denney/Brandon Frazier (USA) — 192.65 (Skate America)
7. Lubov Ilyushechkina/Dylan Moscovitch (CAN) — 190.22 (Skate Canada)

Top U.S. Scores
1. Haven Denney/Brandon Frazier — 192.65 (Skate America)
2. Haven Denney/Brandon Frazier — 188.23 (Skate Canada)
3. Tarah Kayne/Danny O’Shea — 173.50 (Skate America)
4. Marissa Castelli/Mervin Tran — 171.95 (Skate America)

Duhamel and Radford may well be en route to a third straight world title (not done in pairs since 1978). Not only did they win Skate Canada for a third straight year, but the two pairs who joined them on the 2016 World Championships podium aren’t competing in the Grand Prix season. Neither are Olympic champions Tatyana Volosozhar and Maksim Trankov due to pregnancy.

However, Savchenko and Massot raised eyebrows by attempting a throw quadruple Salchow at the end of their Rostelecom Cup free skate. If they can control it — Savchenko fell in Moscow — the gap to the Canadians closes considerably.

The U.S. is once again lacking pairs consistency. The top Americans from the last two worlds, Alexa Scimeca and Chris Knierim, are out due to Scimeca’s health problems. The surprise 2016 U.S. champions, Kayne and O’Shea, were beaten at Skate America by Denney and Frazier, who sat out last season after Denney blew out her right knee.

Ice Dance
Top Grand Prix Scores
1. Tessa Virtue/Scott Moir (CAN) — 189.06 (Skate Canada)
2. Madison Chock/Evan Bates (USA) — 188.24 (Skate Canada)
3. Yekaterina Bobrova/Dmitry Soloviyev (RUS) — 186.68 (Rostelecom Cup)
4. Maia Shibutani/Alex Shibutani (USA) — 185.75 (Skate America)
5. Piper Gilles/Paul Poirier (CAN) — 182.57 (Skate Canada)
6. Madison Chock/Evan Bates (USA) — 182.13 (Rostelecom Cup)
7. Anna Cappellini/Luca Lanotte (ITA) — 180.35 (Skate Canada)

Top U.S. Scores
1. Madison Chock/Evan Bates — 188.24 (Skate Canada)
2. Maia Shibutani/Alex Shibutani — 185.75 (Skate America)
3. Madison Chock/Evan Bates — 182.13 (Rostelecom Cup)
4. Madison Hubbell/Zachary Donohue — 175.77 (Skate America)
5. Kaitlin Hawayek/Jean-Luc Baker — 162.19 (Skate Canada)

The two-time reigning world champions, France’s Gabriella Papadakis and Guillaume Cizeron, make their Grand Prix season debut this week. In their absence, the dance results have gone pretty much to form. Virtue and Moir, the 2010 Olympic champions who sat out the previous two seasons, impressed by beating two-time world medalists Chock and Bates on home ice at Skate Canada.

In the U.S., Chock and Bates and the Shibutani siblings remain in close contention in the early national title handicapping. Hubbell and Donohue finished right behind them at the last four U.S. Championships. That doesn’t figure to change in January. As the U.S. should get three couples at the 2018 Olympics, Hubbell and Donohue will be very interested if Meryl Davis and Charlie White decide to return next season.

MORE: Figure skating season broadcast schedule

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Frances Tiafoe, Taylor Fritz exit French Open, leaving no U.S. men

Associated PressJun 3, 2023, 7:35 PM EDT

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Frances Tiafoe kept coming oh so close to extending his French Open match against Alexander Zverev: 12 times Saturday night, the American was two points from forcing things to a fifth set.

Yet the 12th-seeded Tiafoe never got closer than that.

Instead, the 22nd-seeded Zverev finished out his 3-6, 7-6 (3), 6-1, 7-6 (5) victory after more than 3 1/2 hours in Court Philippe Chatrier to reach the fourth round. With Tiafoe’s exit, none of the 16 men from the United States who were in the bracket at the start of the tournament are still in the field.

“I mean, for the majority of the match, I felt like I was in control,” said Tiafoe, a 25-year-old from Maryland who fell to 1-7 against Zverev.

“It’s just tough,” he said about a half-hour after his loss ended, rubbing his face with his hand. “I should be playing the fifth right now.”

Two other American men lost earlier Saturday: No. 9 seed Taylor Fritz and unseeded Marcos Giron.

No. 23 Francisco Cerundolo of Argentina beat Fritz 3-6, 6-3, 6-4, 7-5, and Nicolas Jarry of Chile eliminated Giron 6-2, 6-3, 6-7 (7), 6-3.

There are three U.S women remaining: No. 6 Coco Gauff, Sloane Stephens and Bernarda Pera.

FRENCH OPEN DRAWS: Women | Men | Broadcast Schedule

It is the second year in a row that zero men from the United States will participate in the fourth round at Roland Garros. If nothing else, it stands as a symbolic step back for the group after what seemed to be a couple of breakthrough showings at the past two majors.

For Tiafoe, getting to the fourth round is never the goal.

“I want to win the trophy,” he said.

Remember: No American man has won any Grand Slam title since Andy Roddick at the 2003 U.S. Open. The French Open has been the least successful major in that stretch with no U.S. men reaching the quarterfinals since Andre Agassi in 2003.

But Tiafoe beat Rafael Nadal in the fourth round of the U.S. Open along the way to getting to the semifinals there last September, the first time in 16 years the host nation had a representative in the men’s final four at Flushing Meadows.

Then, at the Australian Open this January, Tommy Paul, Sebastian Korda and Ben Shelton became the first trio of Americans in the men’s quarterfinals in Melbourne since 2000. Paul made it a step beyond that, to the semifinals.

After that came this benchmark: 10 Americans were ranked in the ATP’s Top 50, something that last happened in June 1995.

On Saturday, after putting aside a whiffed over-the-shoulder volley — he leaned atop the net for a moment in disbelief — Tiafoe served for the fourth set at 5-3, but couldn’t seal the deal.

In that game, and the next, and later on, too, including at 5-all in the tiebreaker, he would come within two points of owning that set.

Each time, Zverev claimed the very next point. When Tiafoe sent a forehand wide to end it, Zverev let out two big yells. Then the two, who have been pals for about 15 years, met for a warm embrace at the net, and Zverev placed his hand atop Tiafoe’s head.

“He’s one of my best friends on tour,” said Zverev, a German who twice has reached the semifinals on the red clay of Paris, “but on the court, I’m trying to win.”

At the 2022 French Open, Zverev tore ligaments in his right ankle while playing Nadal in the semifinals and had to stop.

“It’s been definitely the hardest year of my life, that’s for sure,” Zverev said. “I love tennis more than anything in the world.”

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2023 French Open women’s singles draw, scores

By OlympicTalkJun 3, 2023, 7:30 PM EDT

At the French Open, Iga Swiatek of Poland eyes a third title at Roland Garros and a fourth Grand Slam singles crown overall.

The tournament airs live on NBC Sports, Peacock and Tennis Channel through championship points in Paris.

Swiatek, the No. 1 seed from Poland, can join Serena Williams and Justine Henin as the lone women to win three or more French Opens since 2000.

Having turned 22 on Wednesday, she can become the youngest woman to win three French Opens since Monica Seles in 1992 and the youngest woman to win four Slams overall since Williams in 2002.

FRENCH OPEN: Broadcast Schedule | Men’s Draw

But Swiatek is not as dominant as in 2022, when she went 16-0 in the spring clay season during an overall 37-match win streak.

She retired from her last pre-French Open match with a right thigh injury and said it wasn’t serious. Before that, she lost the final of another clay-court tournament to Australian Open champion Aryna Sabalenka of Belarus.

Sabalenka, the No. 2 seed, is her top remaining challenger in Paris.

No. 3 Jessica Pegula, the highest-seeded American man or woman, was eliminated in the third round. No. 4 Elena Rybakina of Kazakhstan, who has three wins over Swiatek this year, withdrew before her third-round match due to illness.

No. 6 Coco Gauff, runner-up to Swiatek last year, is the best hope to become the first American to win a Grand Slam singles title since Sofia Kenin at the 2020 Australian Open. The 11-major drought is the longest for U.S. women since Seles won the 1996 Australian Open.

MORE: All you need to know for 2023 French Open

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2023 French Open Women’s Singles Draw

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