Overview
- In Milan, the 24-year-old delivered a clean short program to Chopin’s “Nocturne No. 20,” opening with a quad Salchow and drawing a standing ovation.
- He held up a childhood photo in the kiss-and-cry after the scoreboard message, “Mom and Dad, this is for you,” and said he felt their presence on the ice.
- Judges awarded 85.65 points, his best of the season, which secured a place in Friday’s free skate.
- Evgenia Shishkova and Vadim Naumov—1994 world pairs champions and two-time Olympians—were among 67 killed in the Jan. 29, 2025 midair collision near Washington that claimed 28 members of the skating community.
- Naumov has leaned on the Skating Club of Boston community he now helps lead and has framed his season around resilience; separate litigation continues after a December 2025 U.S. filing cited potential errors by controllers and Army pilots.