The most stunning result of Milan Cortina took place on the ice Friday. Ilia Malinin, the “Quad God,” finished eighth after an uneasy performance after entering the free skate in position to cruise to gold. The 21-year-old from Virginia fell on several of his jumps and lost 72 points due t o a handful of uncharacteristic mistakes. His quadruple axel turned into a single, his quadruple loop turned into a double and he fell on his quadruple lutz. Malinin was visibly upset leaving the ice before taking a seat with his father. After receiving his score, Malinin was blunt in his assessment of his performance while speaking on the NBC broadcast. “I was not expecting that,” he said. “I felt so ready getting on that ice. Maybe I was too confident it was going to go well. “I think it was definitely mental. Finally experiencing that Olympic atmosphere, it’s crazy. It’s really different.” Simply put, Malinin was stunned with his mistakes — especially after winning the last 14 competitions he had entered. “I blew it,” Malinin said. “There’s no way that just happened.” Malinin entered the free skate leading after posting a 108.16 in the short program, which put him more than five points clear of second-place Yuma Kagiyama of Japan. But his score of 156.33 in the free skate was 15th best overall, dropping him all the way to eighth in the final standings. Malinin isn’t leaving Italy without a medal, though. He helped Team USA win gold in the team event earlier in the Games. An Olympic gold was widely expected for Malinin, who has dominated the sport for several years. He won gold at the world championships in 2024 and 2025, as well as the U.S. championships in 2023, 2024, 2025 and 2026. Figure Skating Feb 9 Looking back at Tara Lipinski and Johnny Weir's Olympic figure skating careers 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics Feb 8 Are backflips allowed in figure skating? Why everyone is talking about Surya Bonaly Mikhail Shaidorov of Kazakhstan (291.58) took gold in the event, followed by Kagiyama (280.06) and Shun Sato of Japan (274.90). Fellow Americans Andrew Torgashev and Maxim Naumov finished the men’s event in 12th and 20th, respectively. Figure skating will continue in Italy with the pairs (Feb. 15 and 16) and women’s singles program (Feb. 17 and 19). ...read more read less