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© St. Petersburg Times, published February 13, 2002
Monday night's controversial scoring in pairs figure skating sent unprecedented numbers of fans to Olympic Web sites, and the only figures more overwhelming were those in online polls questioning who should have taken home the gold medal.
With more than 100,000 votes by Tuesday afternoon, a poll at NBColympics.com asking "Who should have won the gold in pairs figure skating?" saw 95 percent of votes going to Canada's David Pelletier and Jamie Sale.
The Canadians were relegated to silver Monday when five of the nine judges favored Russia's Elena Berezhnaya and Anton Sikharulidze, drawing immediate shock and scrutiny everywhere from NBC's live broadcast to an International Olympic Committee inquiry reported Tuesday.
"This was the first real mega-story of the Olympics," said NBC Sports' Kevin Monaghan, who monitored traffic to
NBColympics.com and said it compared closely with that seen at news sites on Sept. 11. Public opinion was decidedly against the judges. An AOL poll Tuesday with more than 6,000 responses had just 57 (less than 1 percent) opting for "the Russian team really was better."
NBC's site, coincidentally, had unveiled an interactive feature called "You Be The Judge" in conjunction with Monday's pairs final. If the scores issued by the nine judges have been called into question, the popular vote wasn't exactly void of international bias either, judging by the online results.
"People were just beating on the Russians," said Monaghan, noting a slew of 5.3s and 5.4s given to the Russians in contrast to the friendly 5.9s and 6.0s lavished on the Canadians. After the controversial scoring gave the Russians the gold, about 5,000 fans logged on to give the Canadians high merits after the fact.
Given that NBC's site and Olympics.com are being produced together, the official site gave an impressive level of coverage to the controversy. Despite a play-it-safe headline, "Russian pairs streak stays alive," the site's main link went to an NBC Sports story that included video clips of interviews with key members in the saga.
The site had a six-minute video from Pelletier and Sale's interview with Katie Couric on the Today show, which had restrained but cutting comments about the impact the judging could have on figure skating as a whole.
"We have the judging. Track and field has the doping. Every sport has its problems," said Pelletier, who said the initial thought of silver "was like somebody punching me in the stomach."
The outrage could be seen at other skating-related sites.
At goldenskate.com, busy message-board threads had titles such as "Are you embarrassed for the sport?" and "They were robbed."
Fan sites, for the most part, took the news in stride.
At pairsonice.net, the page devoted to the Canadian duo offered a subtle jab in saying "Congratulations ... on a stunning silver medal performance!"
At davidpelletier.net, a fan site written in French, a prominent link detailed the "unanimous" reaction of the media, with a list of headlines from Canadian newspapers. Le Journal de Montreal wrote "On leur vole l'or," loosely "Gold is stolen," and the Edmonton Journal had "Le rive brise," or "Broken dream."