Pairs is the only U.S. discipline to have only two spots for the World team heading to Boston in March, which dials up the drama a notch as these teams take to the ice in St. Paul. Outside of the favorites, a good rivalry is brewing for second place and that coveted spot on the World team. (In what is perhaps the easiest event to call this season, I’m gonna shorten up my preview format for pairs.)
Alexa Scimeca and Chris Knieirm (Season Average 185.78) should easily win a second U.S. title in St. Paul. The quality of their elements is above the rest of the field and I expect them to bounce back well from their Grand Prix Final disappointment. They confirmed via teleconference that they’ve added a slower section of music to their freeskate to provide variety in music tempo and allow them to better focus on the side-by-side jumps in that section. I expect to see them skating much more confidently here than we’ve seen all season. The battle for the silver medal is most definitely the hottest storyline in pairs, with two up-and-coming teams capable of grabbing the silver medal. Castelli/Tran and Kayne/OShea are very close in terms of scores for the early part of the season and any mistakes by either team can easily open the door for the other. I am picking Tarah Kayne and Danny O’Shea (Season Average 173.12) to win silver based on two things: their stronger scores over the beginning of the season (barely, but still stronger) and the fact that they are coming to St. Paul with a brand new short program set to “Take Me to Church”. I can see that program being received well by the audience and I can see the change bringing an exciting freshness to their performance here. I love the new team of Marissa Castelli and Mervin Tran (Season Average: 172.93), but I just don’t think they are *quite* there yet. I think they have a star quality to them that will develop more strongly over the next few seasons, but they are still smoothing out their technical elements at this point in their partnership. I hope to see them landing their SBS (please, Mervin) and skating well to grab their first U.S. Championships medal-bronze. Jessica Calalang and Zach Sidhu (Season Average:150.61) skated very consistently in their two preseason events, a Challenger event and the NHK Trophy. If they can continue their consistency in St. Paul, that season average looks good for a pewter medal. I was very impressed with Jessica Pfund and Joshua Santillan (Season Average: 144.50) when I saw them at Skate America. I love their “Gravity” short program, and they really showed mental toughness at such a big event. Their elements aren’t technically as difficult as some of the other competitors but their grace under pressure could result in a great top five finish for them. Coming in as a bit of a question mark, Madeline Aaron and Max Settlage could easily play spoiler here in St. Paul. They competed only once this season (143.48) due to injury, but coach Dalilah Sappenfield says these two are coming in prepared. It’s just hard to know where to place them at this point, but don’t count them out.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
About the Blog:Reviews, predictions and opinions in the magical, sparkly and dramatic field of figure skating. Archives
November 2017
Categories |