Â鶹´«Ã½AV

BEIJING — Canadian teen Madeline Schizas reeled off jump after jump against some of the best skaters on the planet on Monday. Like she'd been doing it all her life.

The 18-year-old was the star of Canada's fourth-place squad in figure skating's team event at the Beijing Olympics, and moments after she'd struck her final pose of her free program on Monday, powerfully pumping two satisfied fists, she insisted she'd been a bundle of nerves.

No one would've guessed.

"I'm not going to lie, I was quite nervous," she said. "But I think one of my strengths is just being able to get out there and do it. I treat it as a job. . . . obviously there's emotion behind it, we work towards it forever. But I try not to let it be too emotional."

A reporter jokingly asked: "Are you sure you're not 25?"

She turns 19 on Feb. 14.

In a terrific Olympic debut, the skater from Oakville, Ont., who only a year ago didn't even consider the Olympics in her near-future plans, was third in women's singles free skate, following up a solid short program two days earlier that had propelled Canada into the final round. 

Russia won the team gold with 74 points, while the U.S. took the silver with 65, and Japan won bronze (63).

The Canadians, including Vanessa James, who skated to fourth in pairs with Eric Radford the morning after being involved in a frightening crash in practice, finished with 53 points to edge fifth-place China (50). 

Skating to Puccini's "Madama Butterfly," Schizas was virtually flawless en route to scoring 132.04 points.

Russian phenom Kamila Valieva scored a stunning 178.92 to win the women's singles, making history in the process. The 15-year-old became the first woman to land a quad jump in Olympic competition -- she did two. Kaori Sakamoto of Japan was second (148.66).

Schizas said her nerves on Monday were nowhere near what they'd been back when Canada's journey to Beijing began. Her coach Nancy Lemaire was initially told she wouldn't be permitted aboard Canada's charter flight, because of a "wonky" rapid COVID-19 test.

She eventually tested negative and the two flew to China together as scheduled. But it made for a stressful start.

"That really threw me a little bit, she said. "I was quite upset in the moment . . . because if she had COVID then I shouldn't go either, and the first few days were kind of I think clouded by that."

The team's early arrival in Beijing -- they've been here for eight days -- helped prepare her for the Olympic stage.

"I spent the first five days here being a little bit flustered, a little bit frazzled, but that's why we got here early was to see everything, to skate on Olympic ice, to get over the viewing the (Olympic) rings every day, so I could put up performances like that," she said. "It took me a few days, but now that I've been here, it feels like any other competition."

Despite solid skates by reigning world ice dance bronze medallists Piper Gilles and Paul Poirier and James and Radford in pairs, a medal was already out of reach before the Canadians took the ice on Monday.

James, from Toronto, and Radford, from Balmertown, Ont., scored 130.07 to finish fourth with their pairs free program to Harry Styles' "Falling," an impressive performance considering James' frightening crash a day earlier. The 34-year-old James and Italian Matteo Guarise were both skating backward when they collided hard, Guarise almost somersaulting over James' back. 

"It was our fault," James said.

The crash happened while Guarise and partner Nicole Della Monica were doing their run-through to their music. Fellow skaters are expected to steer clear. 

James had to be helped up as medical staff arrived with a stretcher. She was able to skate gingerly to the boards, holding her right hip. 

"It was not the best situation . . . Matteo is a little bruised, as am I," James said.  "But we're professionals, and we hugged it out after and we wish each other the best, we have a lot of respect for them. It's just one of those freak accidents that we don't expect." 

The Canadians are making their Olympic debut together. Radford won two world titles and Olympic bronze with Meagan Duhamel, but came out of retirement at age 36 last spring to skate with James, who previously competed for France.

Russia's Anastasia Mishina and Aleksandr Galliamov topped the pairs 145.20 points, despite a bad fall.

Gilles, from Toronto, and Poirier, from Unionville, Ont., were third in dance, scoring 124.39 for their free program to Govardo's cover of The Beatles ballad "The Long and Winding Road." 

"It's one of the things we're actually really happy about is having this opportunity to kind of get those nerves out a bit, and we still have four more days until we do our individual," Gilles said on the team event. "So, we can go back and evaluate some of the levels that we may have missed and figure out what we need to do to make sure we hit them when the time comes, and when it's at its most important time."

Americans Madison Chock and Evan Bates led the way with 129.07, while Russians Victoria Sinitsina and Nikita Katsalapov were second with 128.17.

Canada began the day in fourth place, after an excellent women's singles program by Schizas on Sunday clinched the Canadians a berth among the top-five countries that advanced to skate the free programs.

"Madeleine, of course, she was so nervous, because she was either make it or break it," James said. "And we told her to focus on herself, hone in on how she wants to perform, and the rest doesn't even matter. But she killed it. And we're so proud of her, and allowing us to be on the ice today. We're very thankful."

Gilles and Poirier were similarly impressed with Schizas's Olympic debut. 

"It was so special. It was so nice to see someone on her first Olympics skate, just really hit it out of the park like that," Poirier said. "We're really proud of her." 

Watching from back home in Toronto, Nam Nguyen, a former Canadian and world junior champion who didn't qualify for the Beijing team, tweeted: "MADDIE OMG SUPERHERO OF OUR COUNTRY"

Canada captured silver when the team event made its Olympic debut in 2014 in Sochi. A team by ice dancers Tessa Virtue and Scott Moir and including world champions Patrick Chan, Kaitlyn Osmond, and Duhamel and Radford won gold four years ago in Pyeongchang.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 7, 2022.

Lori Ewing, The Canadian Press