Team USA's Alysa Liu wins Olympic figure skating gold

Scott M. Reid, The Orange County Register on Feb 19, 2026

Published in Olympics

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MILAN — At the end of the biggest night in American figure skating in nearly a quarter-century, Dorothy Hamill, Kristi Yamaguchi and Brian Boitano, Olympic champions all, leaned over a wall separating the first row and the ice surface at the Milan Ice Skating Arena, waving Alysa Liu, gold medal around her neck, over to them.

They wanted to welcome Liu to the club.

Liu became the first American woman to win the Olympic figure skating gold medal since 2002, capturing the Winter Games’ most prestigious individual title with a fast-paced, elegant program full of the joy that eluded her when she first emerged on the world scene as a 13-year-old sensation.

Liu, the 20-year-old Bay Area native, four years after she stunned the sport by retiring at age 16 following the 2022 Beijing Olympics, posted season’s best scores both for free skate (150.80) and overall (226.79) and then had to wait through the final two skaters, Japan’s Kaori Sakamoto, a three-time World champion, and Ami Nakai, the competition’s leader after Tuesday’s short program.

Sakamoto came up just short of Liu with an overall score of 224.90 and when Nakai botched the second half of a triple lutz, double toe-loop combination, the gold medal was essentially Liu’s, making the UCLA student the first U.S. woman gold medalist since Sarah Hughes won at the 2002 Olympics in Salt Lake City.

Nakai held on for the bronze at 219.16

Amber Glenn, the three-time U.S. champion who had a disastrous short program Tuesday, led for much of the night after attempting eight triple jumps, landing seven of them for a program score of 147.52 and overall score of 214.96.

It wasn’t until Japan’s Mone Chiba, skating third in the final group of six skaters, posted a score of 217.88 that Glenn relinquished the lead. She finished fifth.

Liu’s victory was a triumph that few in the sport could have envisioned 18 months ago. The youngest U.S. women’s champion in history at 13, then defending her national title a year later, Liu stunned the sport by retiring at 16 after finishing sixth at the 2022 Olympic Games. Then, in a move nearly as shocking, she returned to skating in the summer of 2024 and went on less than a year later to win the world title, the first for a U.S. woman in 19 years.