2026 Winter Olympics Freestyle Skiing and Saturday’s Finals: Stolz Chases Another Medal, Gu in Halfpipe, U.S. Women’s Curling for Bronze

The Winter Games are wrapping up in Italy and the weekend brings a clutch of finals that matter for medal tallies and legacy. At the center of attention: Jordan Stolz, back for the mass start; Eileen Gu in the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final; and the U. S. women's curling team headed to a bronze-medal game. The 2026 Winter Olympics Freestyle Skiing halfpipe final is one of the headline events on Saturday.

Jordan Stolz and the mass start showdown

The Milan Cortina Olympics have been flying by faster than Jordan Stolz, and the 21-year-old Wisconsinite will be on display once more Saturday in his final event of these Games: the mass start. Stolz is one of a handful of Americans who have a shot at earning some hardware to kick off the weekend after winning gold in the 500 meters and 1, 000 meters and then taking silver Thursday in the 1, 500.

China’s Ning Zhongyan set the Olympic record in the 1, 500 with a time of 1: 41. 98; Stolz finished 0. 77 seconds behind that mark while beating Norway's Peder Kongshaug but coming up short of Zhongyan's blistering run. The mass start is a different test: it made its Olympic debut in 2018 and is the only long-track race where every skater starts together. The first three racers to cross the finish line of the 16-lap final win gold, silver and bronze, and skaters use the full track while jockeying for positioning. The event typically goes down to the wire and often includes unpredictable finishes; Belgium's Bart Swings, who won the event in Beijing and took silver in PyeongChang, is again a gold-medal contender.

2026 Winter Olympics Freestyle Skiing: Eileen Gu’s final shot in halfpipe

Eileen Gu’s latest controversial Olympic run will continue on Saturday when she takes part in the women's freestyle skiing halfpipe final. The halfpipe marks her third and final event of these Games. American-born Gu represents China, where her mother was born, and at 22 years old she already carries five Olympic medals.

Gu has yet to win gold in these Games but has earned silvers in the big air and slopestyle events and is proud of those results. The halfpipe offers one more chance to reach the top of a podium in Italy; it is one of two events she won in Beijing four years ago. Gu will face 11 other freestyle skiers in the final, including Team USA's Svea Irving and Kate Gray, who placed eighth and 12th respectively in qualifying on Thursday. Irving is the granddaughter of American author John Irving and was fifth at the 2025 World Championships. Great Britain's Zoe Atkin led all — unclear in the provided context.

U. S. women's curling heads to bronze medal match

The U. S. women's curling team reached the Olympic playoffs for the first time since 2002 but fell short in semifinal action against Switzerland on Friday. Switzerland avenged its loss to the Americans in the round-robin finale, with Alina Pätz described as practically perfect and credited with fueling a 7-4 victory that the narrative says was closer than the score suggests.

Switzerland will face Sweden in the gold-medal game on Sunday. Before that, on Saturday the United States will square off against Canada with the bronze medal on the line. The Americans have never medaled in women's curling, which was added to the Olympic program in 1998. In Salt Lake City 24 years ago, the U. S. lost to Canada in a bronze-medal game; this American squad is hoping to flip the script after notching their first-ever Olympic win over a Canadian team during round-robin play earlier in these Games.

Key storylines to watch Saturday

• How Stolz adapts to the tactics of a mass-start race after sprint success and a narrow silver in the 1, 500.
• Whether Eileen Gu can convert prior podium momentum into a halfpipe medal in her final event here.
• How the U. S. women handle the pressure of a first Olympic bronze opportunity in women's curling against a Canadian side that has history against them.

Uncertainties and what comes next

These storylines will resolve across the weekend as finals play out. Details not fully explicit in the available coverage remain unclear in the provided context and may evolve as results come in. The Games' closing phase in Italy will determine final medal placements and cap a run that introduced a new generation of stars across rink and slope.