U.S. Figure Skating could look very different next year. We already saw a lot of changes this year with Bradie Tennell sitting the season out and Nathan Chen missing Worlds. There have also been multiple athletes announcing their retirement like Alysa Liu, Madison Hubbell and Zachary Donohue, and possibly Vincent Zhou.
However, there were flashes of hope for the future with the athletes on the junior circuit for the U.S. this year. Nothing exemplified this better than the results for the 2022 World Junior Figure Skating Championships that took place on April 14-17, where Americans took the gold medals in three out of the four disciplines.
Ilia Malinin rebounded from a disappointing senior Worlds to win the junior title. He earned an overall score of 276.11, which put him over 40 points ahead of the silver medalist. Malinin’s margin of victory was the largest ever at the Junior World Championships. Malinin’s score is also about 13 points higher than what he earned at senior Worlds, where he had a mistake riddled free program. This is especially impressive because Malinin could not perform quads in the short program for junior Worlds like he did at the senior level.
With uncertainty surrounding the return of Nathan Chen and Vincent Zhou next season, it seems like Malinin is rising to the challenge of replacing the two men who have been top competitors internationally for years. Malinin already bested Zhou and skating veteran Jason Brown earlier this year in the U.S. Championships. However, this win at Junior Worlds cemented Malinin as a threat for international podiums.
The U.S. also did well in the women’s discipline with Isabeau Levito winning the junior title and Lindsay Thorngren coming in third. It is important to note that Russian skaters are still not allowed to compete, which can arguably be most felt in the women’s discipline. Young Russian skaters perform the most difficult jumps in the world, and the U.S. ladies will not be able to put up scores as high as their Russian counterparts when they return. However, with World bronze medalist Alysa Liu retiring from skating earlier this month, the results of the World Junior Championships offer optimism to U.S. figure skating fans.
Levito seems to be the skater most likely to make a mark on the senior circuit. While she was too young to compete at the senior level this season, she will be able to debut next year. Levito already won the bronze medal at this year’s U.S. Championships, coming in behind only Mariah Bell and Karen Chen.
The U.S. also saw promise in young ice dancers Oona and Gage Brown, who earned the gold medal at Junior Worlds. The siblings earned their personal best international score at the event with a score of 170.25, beating their old record by more than 15 points. Though they did not compete in the U.S. Championships in 2022, they still had a good showing on the Junior Grand Prix Circuit, winning a gold and silver at their two events.
Katarina Wolfkostin and Jeffery Chen, another ice dance team, finished just off the podium in fourth place. The pair got off to a rocky start, earning ninth place in the short program after they fell on their first element. However, they took second place in the free skate, only bested by the Browns. Wolfkostin and Chen earned a score of 157.64 overall, about 30 points shy of what the pair earned at the U.S Championships this season, where they came in sixth, scoring 187.27. There is a lot of promise with this team when they limit mistakes, and many other young teams that look like they can step up to replace Hubbell and Donohue, even if it takes a couple more seasons of development.
It is not shocking that pairs was the weakest discipline for the Americans, even though the U.S. team did finish just off the podium in fourth. Anastasiia Smirnova and Danylo Siianytsia were the lone U.S. team competing at Junior Worlds for pairs, earning third in the short program and fifth in the free, scoring 148.53 overall. The U.S. had not seen much success internationally for decades until this season when Alexa Knierim and Brandon Frazier won the gold medal at Worlds. However, this is still the discipline where the U.S. has the most room to improve and needs a team to replace Knierim and Frazier when they retire. It is also the discipline in which a new team right off the junior circuit has the most room to make an immediate splash at the senior level.
There is always a lot of turnover in figure skating after an Olympic season. As U.S. Figure Skating gets ready for a new Olympic cycle, it makes sense to start looking for rising stars. While figure skating fans could still see Nathan Chen, Madison Chock and Evan Bates, and other standout Team USA members in the coming years, it is likely that the names that are winning 2022 Junior Worlds could be stars of the senior circuit sooner than one might think.