Olympics 2022: Mixed emotions as US figure skating team wins silver; Zhou contracts COVID-19

US figure skaters celebrate their silver medal for the team competition.

American figure skaters gathered on the podium to celebrate their silver medal accomplishment, the highest finish since the figure skating team event was introduced in the 2014 Olympics 

"Where's Vincent?" asked Karen Chen, who came back from a stumble Sunday to help the team zoom up to the second-place finish behind the Russians.

The dance pair of Madison Chock and Evan Bates told the rest of the skaters that Vincent Zhou had tested positive on a COVID-19 test deflating the medal ceremony for the Americans. 

Zhou failed his second COVID-19 test Monday and had to withdraw from the men's figure-skating competition.

In an emotional five-minute video, Zhou said, “It’s pretty unreal that of all the people, it would happen to myself. And that’s not just because I’m still processing this turn of events, but also because I have been doing everything in my power to stay free of covid since the start of the pandemic.”

After a spectacular start on the first day, mostly because of Nathan Chen's spectacular skate, the US was about to drop to third after the second day stumbles of Zhou and Karen Chen.

“I definitely felt a little more pressure because I felt like I needed to redeem myself,” said Chen on Monday. “I think definitely just coming back from yesterday is a huge thing for me.”

Chen's performance plus the Chock and Evan's near flawless dance earned them the No. 1 spot over the favorite team from Russia. “I think it was hard to be completely oblivious to the nature of the scores,” Bates said. “At the end of the day, we just focused on what we could do to contribute in a significant way. We knew we could win the free dance.”

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