Still waiting for Czisny to put it together

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

You keep waiting for the Paul Wylie moment from Alissa Czisny.

(For those who need a quick refresher: Wylie had a stunning elegance on the ice, but that made little difference until the 1992 Olympics because of his technical inconsistency. At the 1991 world championships, he barely qualified for the free skate before finishing 11th overall. He never would finish higher than ninth at worlds. Then, seemingly out of nowhere, he produced two terrific programs to win a silver medal at the 1992 Winter Games -- and many thought Wylie should have won gold.)

Czisny, a 21-year-old senior at Bowling Green, has the same striking elegance, but she usually can’t stay upright.

One time she did, at the 2007 U.S. Championships, and Czisny won the free skate.

But her title chances were gone then after the short program, when she did a single lutz instead of a planned triple.

So here she was at Skate Canada, against an eminently beatable field after Italy’s Carolina Kostner (a more decorated version of Czisny) imploded in the short program and slopped through the free skate.

But Czisny fell in the short program. Then her flawed but very attractive free skate Saturday night was good enough to beat the usually over-scored Kostner and move her from sixth to third in the overall standings. Czisny was second in the free skate.

Last year’s other U.S. phenom, Caroline Zhang, struggled even more than 15-year-old compatriot Mirai Nagasu had at Skate America.

Zhang fell in the free skate (as she had in the short program), popped another jump and wound up a non-contending fifth.

Meanwhile, Canada’s Joannie Rochette skated two very solid programs to win in a runaway -- 25 points ahead of runnerup Fumie Suguri of Japan, 31 ahead of Czisny and 37 ahead of Zhang.

Which makes it two weeks in a row that U.S. women have been hopelessly outclassed.

-- Philip Hersh