By Rory Carroll and Lori Ewing
MILAN, Feb 8 (Reuters) – Kaori Sakamoto delivered a spellbinding performance to leave Japan tied with the United States in the team event at the Milano Cortina Olympics, setting up a thrilling men’s free skate finale that will decide the medals later on Sunday.
Sakamoto’s sensational performance earned her top place with 148.62 points, while American Amber Glenn had to settle for third after she endured two botched landings at the start of her routine – a result which wiped out the United States’ lead heading into the final competition of the team event.
Georgia’s Anastasiia Gubanova finished second.
The U.S. are tied with Japan on 59 points, with hosts Italy on 52, Georgia 50 and Canada 47.
U.S. hopes of defending their gold medal from Beijing now rest on the shoulders of the 21-year-old self-described “Quad God” Ilia Melinin, who himself had a disappointing performance during Saturday’s short programme.
Japan came into the final day of the team competition trailing the U.S. by five points but their gold medal hopes were given new life with a stunning pairs performance by Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara that reduced them to tears on Sunday and cut the Americans’ overall lead to two points.
The Japanese world champions opened with a triple twist lift and Miura was left punching the air in delight as they closed their programme with Kihara lifting her above him into their final pose — a performance that earned them a season’s best 155.55 from the judges.
“We were trying to aim for about 145 or a little bit higher, and when we saw that it was 155, there was so much joy… we were overwhelmed with emotions,” Miura told reporters.
(Reporting by Rory Carroll and Lori Ewing in Milan; Editing by Pritha Sarkar)
