FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, February 22nd, 2018
2018 PYEONGCHANG OLYMPICS – FEB. 22 DAYTIME HIGHLIGHTS ON THE NETWORKS OF NBCUNIVERSAL
“If I didn’t see it with my own eyes, it would be hard to believe it was done.” – Kristi Yamaguchi on Alina Zagitova’s triple jump combination
“This is just like NASCAR on ice” – Dale Earnhardt Jr. on Short Track Speed Skating
“Nobody is thinking about Sochi now.” – Jeremy Roenick on Team USA’s Gold Medal Win Over Canada
NBC’s Primetime Coverage, Live Across All Time Zones, Begins at 8 p.m. ET Tonight Featuring Bradie Tennell, Mirai Nagasu & Karen Chen in Free Skate
All Events Live Streamed on NBCOlympics.com and the NBC Sports app
STAMFORD, Conn. – February 22, 2018 – Tonight’s primetime coverage of the XXIII Olympic Winter Games from PyeongChang, South Korea, is highlighted by:
- NBC’s primetime presentation, which begins at 8 p.m. ET live across all time zones, featuring the ladies’ free skate, as Team USA’s Bradie Tennell, Mirai Nagasu, and Karen Chen take on frontrunners Yevgenia Medvedeva and Alina Zagitova, competing as Olympic Athletes from Russia;
- Short track gold medal finals in the men’s 500m, women’s 1000m, and 5000m relay in primetime on NBC.
*outdoor events subject to weather conditions
Click here for a preview of tonight’s primetime action.
Following are highlights from today’s coverage of the 2018 PyeongChang Winter Olympics on NBC and the networks of NBCUniversal:
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WOMEN’S HOCKEY – NBCSN
Studio analyst Jeremy Roenick on Team USA’s approach for the third period, trailing 2-1: “It’s time for a sense of desperation. No sense in being conservative. For a lot of these women, this is the biggest period they will ever play. Time to spend it and time to grab that gold.”
Analyst Pierre McGuire on the hit to the head of Brianna Decker: “And that’s not a penalty? Marie-Philip Poulin just planted her. In international hockey that’s usually five minutes. And here it will be nothing.”
Play-by-play commentator Kenny Albert: “Team USA has won the gold medal in women’s ice hockey for the second time, the first time since 1998, thanks to one final save by a goaltender who was 7 1/2 months old the last time the U.S. took home the gold.”
Analyst AJ Mleczko on the disappointment of a silver medal: “Every year, the silver medal winning team has tears in their eyes. I’ve been there. People say, ‘How can you be so upset when you win a silver medal?’ It’s so hard to be that close to the ultimate goal, that gold medal, and fall short.”
Mleczko on silver medal: “It’s taken me a long time to appreciate it. For a long time, I didn’t feel like I won the silver, I felt as if we lost the gold.”
Roenick: “Nobody is thinking about Sochi now.”
Watch the full shootout between the USA and Canada here.
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MEN’S CURLING – NBCSN
Play-by-play commentator Jason Knapp on American curler John Shuster and Team USA advancing on to the gold medal game: “Team USA has been practicing, prepping, planning for this moment. For John Shuster, man he has had to have dreamt about it. The two previous Olympics – some skips, some missed shots, bad experiences. He said he was not having fun the past two and a half Olympics. He started having fun a few games ago to send the U.S. to the gold medal game.”
Shuster to reporter Trenni Kusnierek following the semifinal game: “It means the world. I got an Olympic medal back in 2006 with Team Fenson, a great team. I remember what it felt like standing on the podium having an Olympic medal around your neck and the pride, but watching someone else’s flag go up to the top and their national anthem. To see that American flag at the top in the middle and hear our national anthem with a gold medal around our necks, it is something I have dreamed about since the time I was a little kid.”
Knapp on Shuster: “He has turned things around. He has flipped the script a little bit (from 2-7 records at Vancouver and Sochi Olympics), pushing Team USA to the playoffs in men’s curling for the first time since 2006.”
Kusnierek on the pressure put on the Canadian men’s team after the women did not qualify for the playoffs for the first time in history: “As Kevin Martin can attest to, Canadians expect medals from their curlers.”
Knapp: “For a little understanding, the Canadian women not making the playoffs in curling at an Olympics is kind of like USA basketball failing to make the playoffs at the Olympics. It is that big of a deal north of the border.”
Watch Team USA defeat Canada to advance on to the gold medal game here.
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SHORT TRACK – NBCSN
Analyst Apolo Ohno: “China’s hungry. They look better than ever in the 500m. Their eyes are on the prize.”
Play-by-play commentator Ted Robinson on Chinese short track speed skater Wu Dajing in the men’s 500m: “A world record for the second time tonight and China’s historic first men’s short track gold.”
Ohno: “Unbelievable how fast that man just skated…It was absolutely perfect in every single way. It was a symphony of short track 500m specialty.”
Ohno on Dutch short track speed skater Suzanne Schulting’s win in the women’s 1000m: “An unbelievable upset!”
Robinson: “And Schulting has won the first gold medal in short track history for the Netherlands.”
Olympic contributor Dale Earnhardt Jr. joined play-by-play commentator Ted Robinson and analyst Apolo Ohno in the booth to discuss the similarities between short track speed skating and NASCAR racing. Below are excerpts from that conversation.
Earnhardt: “This is just like NASCAR on ice. They are so aggressive, I can’t believe it, so much action. This is quickly becoming my favorite sport this week. It is really interesting and there are a lot of similarities. All the chess match strategy.”
Watch Earnhardt Jr’s on-air debut as an Olympic contributor here.
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WOMEN’S ALPINE SKIING
American alpine ski racer Mikaela Shiffrin joined host Carolyn Manno to discuss winning two medals at the Games. Following are excerpts from that conversation.
Manno: “You seem a bit relieved.”
Shiffrin: “Right now that is definitely how I feel because it has definitely been a stressful lead up to the Olympics, and two weeks with the events being rescheduled for different days.”
Manno: “How satisfied are you having those two medals around your neck at the end of these Olympics?”
Shiffrin: “It is incredible. I came to the Olympics knowing that I could be a multiple, two or three, medal contender, but I also knew I could come away with nothing. And walking away with nothing would have felt like a huge disappointment for sure.”
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FIGURE SKATING – NBCSN
Analyst Kristi Yamaguchi joined host Ahmed Fareed to preview this evening’s ladies’ free skate. Following are excerpts from that conversation.
Yamaguchi on Russian figure skater Alina Zagitova’s five triple jump combination in practice: “So this combination has more triple loops in one pass than most girls will do in their entire long program. If I didn’t see it with my own eyes, it would be hard to believe it was done.”
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MEN’S NORDIC COMBINED – NBCSN
Play-by-play commentator Steve Schlanger on Team Germany’s alpine skiing victory: “The Germans sweep PyeongChang in Nordic combined…dominating this event… three events, three golds for the Germans in Nordic combined this year at the Olympics in South Korea…This is the exact same podium as the world championships last year. Germany, Norway, Austria – gold, silver and bronze.”
Watch German’s record-breaking Nordic combined gold here.
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— PYEONGCHANG 2018 —
