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MILAN — The 2026 Winter Olympicspairs figure skating champion will be crowned, but it’s a near mystery who will be at the podium.
Pairs will conclude with the free skate Monday, Feb. 16, and in the lead is the German team of Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin, with a great shot at gold. After that, anything can happen. Several of the favorites faltered in the short program, making for a fun race for medals.
Americans Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea, as well as Spencer Akira Howe and Emily Chan, had strong opening performances, and while not near the top, they have an opportunity to surprise. Kam and O'Shea enter the night in seventh place after the short program. Howe and Chan are ninth.
USA TODAY Sports has live coverage of the scores, results and highlights for Olympic pairs figure skating:
Meet Team USA 2026: Get to know the athletes behind the games
Here are the running scores for the pairs' short program.
Group 1
Group 2
Group 3
Group 4
Team USA has two pairs competing at the Olympics: Team gold medalists Danny O'Shea and Ellie Kam, as well as Spencer Akira Howe and Emily Chan.
Loop: The skater jumps off a back outside edge of their skate and lands on the same edge.
Toe jump: A skater drives the toe pick of their non-takeoff foot into the ice to launch themselves into the air and generate momentum into the jump.
Toe loop: A skater takes off backward and lands on the same back edge of their blade.
Lutz: A skater moving backward jumps off the back outside edge of their skate and uses the toe-pick of their other skate to catapult into the air in the opposite direction and lands on the back outside edge of the picking leg.
Flip: A skater launches off the back inside edge of one skate and lands on the back outside edge of the other skate.
Edge jump: A skater takes off not with their toe pick but off the edge of their skate.
Salchow: A skater launches off the back inside edge of one skate and lands on the back outside edge of their other skate.
Axel: The only forward-facing jump, a skater lands on the back outside edge of their non-takeoff foot while traveling backward. The axel is the hardest jump because of the extra half-revolution that comes with a forward takeoff and a backward landing.
USA TODAY Sports has a team of more than a dozen journalists on the ground in Italy to bring you behind the scenes with Team USA and keep you up to date with every medal win, big moment and triumphant finish. Get our Chasing Gold newsletter in your inbox every morning and join our WhatsApp channel to get the latest updates right in your texts.
The 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics are off and running with 16 sports taking over 25 different venues. The games are exclusively airing across NBC's suite of networks with many events airing live on its streaming service, Peacock, which you can sign up for here .
All times Eastern and accurate as of Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026, at 8:00 p.m.
Sign up for Peacock here
See the full Milano Cortina Games schedule
See the 2026 Medal Count Here
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Olympics figure skating live updates: How to watch pairs competition
Continue reading...
Pairs will conclude with the free skate Monday, Feb. 16, and in the lead is the German team of Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin, with a great shot at gold. After that, anything can happen. Several of the favorites faltered in the short program, making for a fun race for medals.
Americans Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea, as well as Spencer Akira Howe and Emily Chan, had strong opening performances, and while not near the top, they have an opportunity to surprise. Kam and O'Shea enter the night in seventh place after the short program. Howe and Chan are ninth.
USA TODAY Sports has live coverage of the scores, results and highlights for Olympic pairs figure skating:
Meet Team USA 2026: Get to know the athletes behind the games
Figure skating pairs live results, updates
Here are the running scores for the pairs' short program.
Group 1
- Camille Kovalev and Pavel Kovalev (France): 64.65 short program
- Ioulia Chtchetinina and Michal Wozniak (Poland): 65.23 short program
- Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps (Canada): 66.04 short program
- Anastasia Vaipan-Law and Luke Digby (Great Britain): 66.07 short program
Group 2
- Karina Akopova and Nikita Rakhmanin (Armenia): 66.27 short program
- Annika Hocke and Robert Kunkel (Germany): 67.52 short program
- Rebecca Ghilardi and Filippo Ambrosini (Italy): 69.08 short program
- Emily Chan and Spencer Akira Howe (United States): 71.06 short program
Group 3
- Sara Conti and Niccolo Macii (Italy): 71.70 short program
- Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea (United States): 71.87 short program
- Wenjing Sui and Cong Han (China): 72.66 short program
- Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara (Japan): 73.11 short program
Group 4
- Maria Pavlova and Axeli Sviatchenko (Hungary): 73.87 short program
- Lia Pereira and Trennt Michaud (Canada): 74.60 short program
- Anatasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava (Georgia): 75.46 short program
- Minerva Fabienne Hase and Nikita Volodin (Germany): 80.01 short program
US pairs figure skating Olympics 2026
Team USA has two pairs competing at the Olympics: Team gold medalists Danny O'Shea and Ellie Kam, as well as Spencer Akira Howe and Emily Chan.
Figure skating jump types
Loop: The skater jumps off a back outside edge of their skate and lands on the same edge.
Toe jump: A skater drives the toe pick of their non-takeoff foot into the ice to launch themselves into the air and generate momentum into the jump.
Toe loop: A skater takes off backward and lands on the same back edge of their blade.
Lutz: A skater moving backward jumps off the back outside edge of their skate and uses the toe-pick of their other skate to catapult into the air in the opposite direction and lands on the back outside edge of the picking leg.
Flip: A skater launches off the back inside edge of one skate and lands on the back outside edge of the other skate.
Edge jump: A skater takes off not with their toe pick but off the edge of their skate.
Salchow: A skater launches off the back inside edge of one skate and lands on the back outside edge of their other skate.
Axel: The only forward-facing jump, a skater lands on the back outside edge of their non-takeoff foot while traveling backward. The axel is the hardest jump because of the extra half-revolution that comes with a forward takeoff and a backward landing.
USA TODAY at the Milano Cortina Games
USA TODAY Sports has a team of more than a dozen journalists on the ground in Italy to bring you behind the scenes with Team USA and keep you up to date with every medal win, big moment and triumphant finish. Get our Chasing Gold newsletter in your inbox every morning and join our WhatsApp channel to get the latest updates right in your texts.
The 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics are off and running with 16 sports taking over 25 different venues. The games are exclusively airing across NBC's suite of networks with many events airing live on its streaming service, Peacock, which you can sign up for here .
All times Eastern and accurate as of Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026, at 8:00 p.m.
Feb. 16 Winter Olympics TV Schedule
- 1:00 AM - PRIMETIME IN MILAN (REPLAY) Speed Skating, Alpine Skiing, Figure Skating, and more NBC, PEACOCK
- 1:15 AM - SKI JUMPING (REPLAY) (Medal Event) Women's Large Hill USA NETWORK
- 2:00 AM - FIGURE SKATING (REPLAY) Pairs' Short Program USA NETWORK
- 4:00 AM - ALPINE SKIING (LIVE) Men's Slalom: Run 1 USA NETWORK, PEACOCK
- 4:50 AM - SNOWBOARDING (LIVE) Women's Slopestyle Qualification USA NETWORK
- 6:35 AM - SHORT TRACK (LIVE) (Medal Event) Women's 1000m Final USA NETWORK
- 7:00 AM - BOBSLED (REPLAY) Men's Doubles: Heat 1 and 2 USA NETWORK
- 7:30 AM - ALPINE SKIING (LIVE) (Medal Event) Men's Slalom: Run 2 Final USA NETWORK, PEACOCK
- 8:35 AM - SNOWBOARDING (LIVE) Men's Slopestyle Qualification USA NETWORK
- 10:00 AM - SNOWBOARDING (REPLAY) Women's Slopestyle Qualification NBC
- 10:15 AM - CURLING: China vs Canada (REPLAY) Women's Preliminary Round USA NETWORK
- 10:40 AM - ICE HOCKEY: (LIVE) Women's Semifinal #1 NBC, PEACOCK
- 11:30 AM - CURLING: Great Britain vs Norway (REPLAY) Men's Preliminary Round USA NETWORK
- 12:45 PM - SHORT TRACK (LIVE) (Medal Event) M 500m Qual, W 1000m Final, M 1000m Semi USA NETWORK
- 1:00 PM - BOBSLED (LIVE) (Medal Event) Women's Singles: Heat 3 and 4 Final NBC, PEACOCK
- 1:30 PM - FREESTYLE SKIING (LIVE) (Medal Event) Women's Big Air Final NBC, PEACOCK
- 1:45 PM - FIGURE SKATING PREVIEW (LIVE) USA NETWORK
- 2:00 PM - FIGURE SKATING (LIVE) Pairs' Free Skate USA NETWORK, PEACOCK
- 2:45 PM - ALPINE SKIING (REPLAY) (Medal Event) Men's Slalom: Run 1 & 2 Final NBC
- 3:30 AM - BOBSLED (LIVE) (Medal Event) Women's Singles: Heat 4 Final NBC, PEACOCK
- 3:55 PM - FIGURE SKATING (LIVE) Pairs' Free Skate NBC
- 4:15 PM - ICE HOCKEY: (REPLAY) Women's Semifinal USA NETWORK
- 5:00 PM - CURLING: United States vs Italy (REPLAY) Women's Preliminary Round CNBC
- 5:30 PM - BOBSLED (REPLAY) Men's Doubles: Heat 1 and 2 USA NETWORK
- 6:00 PM - ICE HOCKEY: (REPLAY) Women's Semifinal USA NETWORK
- 8:00 PM - PRIMETIME IN MILAN (REPLAY) Figure Skating, Freestyle Skiing, Bobsled, and more NBC, PEACOCK
- 8:00 PM - ICE HOCKEY: (REPLAY) Women's Semifinal USA NETWORK
- 10:00 PM - SNOWBOARDING (REPLAY) Women's Slopestyle Qualification USA NETWORK
- 10:30 PM - SNOWBOARDING (REPLAY) Men's Slopestyle Qualification USA NETWORK
- 11:00 PM - SKI JUMPING (REPLAY) (Medal Event) Men's Super Team USA NETWORK
- 11:35 PM - OLYMPIC LATE NIGHT (REPLAY) Snowboarding and more NBC, PEACOCK
Feb. 16 Winter Olympics Streaming Schedule
Sign up for Peacock here
- 3:05 AM - CURLING: China vs Canada (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 3:05 AM - CURLING: Denmark vs Great Britain (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 3:05 AM - CURLING: Sweden vs Switzerland (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 4:00 AM - BOBSLED (LIVE) Men's Doubles: Heat 1 and 2 PEACOCK
- 4:30 AM - SNOWBOARDING (LIVE) Women's Slopestyle Qualification PEACOCK
- 5:00 AM - SHORT TRACK (LIVE) Men's 500m Qualification PEACOCK
- 5:00 AM - SHORT TRACK (LIVE) Men's 5000m Relay Semifinals PEACOCK
- 5:00 AM - SHORT TRACK (LIVE) (Medal Event) Women's 1000m Prelims, Final PEACOCK
- 8:00 AM - GOLD ZONE: DAY 10 (LIVE) Digital Exclusive PEACOCK
- 8:00 AM - SNOWBOARDING (LIVE) Men's Slopestyle Qualification PEACOCK
- 8:05 AM - CURLING: Italy vs China (LIVE) Men's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 8:05 AM - CURLING: Great Britain vs Norway (LIVE) Men's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 8:05 AM - CURLING: Sweden vs Germany (LIVE) Men's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 8:05 AM - CURLING: Czechia vs Canada (LIVE) Men's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 1:00 PM - SKI JUMPING (LIVE) (Medal Event) Men's Super Team PEACOCK
- 1:05 PM - CURLING: South Korea vs China (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 1:05 PM - CURLING: United States vs Italy (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 1:05 PM - CURLING: Switzerland vs Great Britain (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 1:05 PM - CURLING: Japan vs Canada (LIVE) Women's Preliminary Round PEACOCK
- 3:10 PM - ICE HOCKEY: (LIVE) Women's Semifinal #2 PEACOCK
More 2026 Winter Olympics
See the full Milano Cortina Games schedule
See the 2026 Medal Count Here
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Olympics figure skating live updates: How to watch pairs competition
Continue reading...
