Kagiyama and Sakamoto lead Japanese sweep of men's and women's short programs at NHK Trophy

TOKYO — Defending champion Yuma Kagiyama performed a near-flawless routine on Friday to lead a Japanese sweep of the men’s figure skating short program at the NHK Trophy.

Skating to “The Sound of Silence,” Kagiyama nailed an effortless quadruple salchow on his opening jump and followed with a quad toeloop-triple toeloop combination.

The 2022 Olympic silver medalist added a triple axel to finish with a season-best 105.70 points.

“I was trying to equal the score I had at the Olympics but was three points short,” the three-time world silver medalist said. “Today’s performance, from beginning to end, went just as planned.”

Kagiyama’s compatriot Kao Miura was second with a personal-best 102.96 points while Tatsuya Tsuboi completed a sweep of the top three places for the host nation with 85.02.

“All three skaters did what they needed to do today,” Kagiyama said. “Tatsuya had great flow and we were given great motivation. Kao was creating real momentum and I needed to do well.”

Andrew Torgashev of the United States was fourth with 84.36.

In the women’s short program, three-time and reigning world champion Kaori Sakamoto of Japan finished first with a season-best 78.93 points.

Sakamoto, who won gold at Skate Canada two weeks ago, opened with a double axel and also cleanly landed a triple lutz and triple flip-triple toeloop combination.

“I was very pleased with the lutz and it was highly evaluated,” Sakamoto said. “I was able to concentrate well throughout the entire routine.”

Like the men’s short program, the women’s top three was also swept by the host nation.

Mone Chiba was second with 71.69, followed by Yuna Aoki with 69.78.

Alysa Liu of the United States, who is making a comeback, was fourth with 65.03.

Liu started off with a triple flip-triple toeloop combination and landed a double axel and a triple lutz later in her routine.

Two-time world champions Madison Chock and Evan Bates of the United States were first after the ice dance short program.

The U.S. champions, who were second at Skate America, collected level fours and threes for their elements for a season’s best score of 86.32 points.

“We made some really good strides since Skate America, specifically with this program,” Bates said. “We put a lot of effort into improving it and changed some of the music, some of the choreography, which can be challenging in the midst of the Grand Prix.”

Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko, also of the United States, were second with 79.64, followed by Allison Reed and Saulius Ambrulevicius of Lithuania with 77.91.

In pairs, skating to “Paint it Black,” world silver medalists Riku Miura and Ryuichi Kihara of Japan were first after the short program with 71.90 points.

Miura and Kihara completed a triple twist, throw triple lutz but Miura landed forward on a triple toe which was downgraded.

“There was a mistake we were able to recover from ... that was very good for us,” Miura said. “Our choreographer has changed and we thought we needed to create something new.”

Anastasiia Metelkina and Luka Berulava of Georgia were second with 70.28, followed by Ellie Kam and Danny O’Shea of the U.S. with 69.15.

The NHK Trophy is the fourth event in the ISU’s Grand Prix of Figure Skating Series.

A total of 60 skaters and couples are representing 16 countries in men’s women’s, pairs and ice dance competitions.

The next round of the GP Series is Nov. 15-17 at the Finlandia Trophy in Helsinki, Finland.