Sports Headlines

Figure Skaters Arrive For Championships

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Reporter: WOWT

The 2013 Prudential U.S. Figure Skating Championships will be held Jan. 20-27, in Omaha, Neb. All novice, junior and senior competition will be held at CenturyLink Center Omaha with practices and juvenile and intermediate competition taking place at CenturyLink Center, the Omaha Convention Center and the Omaha Civic Arena.

More than 370 figure skaters will compete at the juvenile, intermediate, novice, junior and senior levels for 20 U.S. titles in ladies, men’s, pairs and ice dancing. Several members of the 2012 U.S. World Team are set to compete, including reigning U.S. champions Ashley Wagner (ladies), Jeremy Abbott (men’s) and Meryl Davis & Charlie White (ice dancing). Caydee Denney and John Coughlin, the 2012 U.S. pairs champions, will not compete in Omaha due to injury.

Official practice begins Saturday, Jan. 19, for all four novice disciplines and junior ladies and men’s. Competition starts Sunday, Jan. 20, at 9:50 a.m. (CST) with the novice pattern dance.

NBC will provide eight hours of live, high-definition coverage of senior-level events, including three hours in primetime. In total, NBC will air 10 hours of skating, including the two-hour Smucker’s Skating Spectacular, airing from 1-3 p.m. (EST) on Saturday, Feb. 2. The U.S. Championships will be carried in more than 127 countries and be available to nearly 300 million homes worldwide.

NBC’s broadcast team of Mike “Doc” Emrick and Steve Schlanger (play-by-play), Scott Hamilton (analyst), Sandra Bezic (analyst), Tracy Wilson (analyst) and Andrea Joyce (reporter) will call the action in Omaha.