Madison Chock and Evan Bates danced their way to a record-setting seventh U.S. Figure Skating title on Saturday night, showcasing their trademark creativity, athleticism and precision in their final competition before the Milan Cortina Olympics.

Now, the countdown is on for the moment they have waited for the past four years.

“We like to build momentum through the season,” Bates said, “and it’s a great feeling going into a big event knowing you skated well the previous event. So we’re going to roll with that momentum into Milan.”

Chock and Bates have dominated ice dance ever since they finished fourth at the Beijing Games, arguably the most disappointing and frustrating placement for any Olympian. They have won the past three world titles, the past three gold medals at the Grand Prix Final, and they have nobody within sight of them when it comes to competing against fellow Americans.

Performing a flamenco-styled dance to a version of the Rolling Stones hit “Paint It Black” from the dystopian sci-fi Western drama “Westworld,” Chock and Bates produced a season-best free skate inside Enterprise Center and finished with 228.87 points.

Emilea Zingas and Vadym Kolesnik were second with 213.65 points and Christina Carreira and Anthony Ponomarenko were third with 206.95, making those two pairs the likely choices to join Chock and Bates on the American squad for the Winter Games.

There wasn’t much drama in the dance competition.

At least for the top step.

Yet sometimes the winning programs aren’t necessarily the ones that win over the crowd. And while Oona Brown and Gage Brown only finished fifth, the sister-brother duo — former world junior champions — earned the first standing ovation of the night for their moody, creative and almost cinematic program set to selections from the film “The Godfather.”

“I think that was one of the best — if not the best — performances we’ve had,” Gage Brown said afterward.

The Browns ended a stretch in which several couples taking the ice made some kind of significant mistake, whether it was a skater stumbling to the ice, someone getting out of synch with their twizzles, or some other calamitous misfortune.

Then it was a parade of near-perfect programs, each couple trying to upstage the previous one.

Emily Bratti and Ian Somerville were the first to knock the Brown siblings from first place, then reigning bronze medalists Caroline Green and Michael Parsons took over first place with their program, set to “Escalate” by Tsar B and “Son of Nyx” by Hozier.

Carreira and Ponomarenko, the U.S. silver medalists the past two years, knew a podium spot would probably earn them a spot on the Olympic team when they took the ice. And they delivered with a sharp program in which they seemed to channel the feeling and the characters from the 2006 psychological thriller film “Perfume: The Story of a Murder.”

“We had a bit of a rocky start to this season,” said Carreira, who was born in Canada but receiver her U.S. citizenship in November, making her eligible to compete at the Olympics. “I’m happy we got our act together and delivered a good performance here.”

It wound up being good enough for bronze.

That’s because the 23-year-old Zingas, who made the difficult witch from singles to dance about four years ago, and the 24-year-old Kolesnik quickly assumed the top spot with a program set to music by Sergei Prokofiev from the ballet of “Romeo and Juliet.”

“It hasn’t been an easy journey,” Zingas said, “and I think our unique approach to this season, and our unique style on the ice, really helped us, and it’s really an emotional moment to be sitting here.”

Zingas and Kolesnik only held the top spot for about four minutes — the length of the free skate by Chock and Bates.

It almost seemed to be a forgone conclusion that they would win Saturday night. But the real pressure now begins: Chock and Bates finished eighth at the 2014 Olympics, ninth four years later, and came in fourth at the Winter Games in 2022.

Yes, they helped the Americans win team gold in Beijing, but even that was somewhat tainted. They never got a medal ceremony there because of a long investigation into Russian doping, which pushed their presentation all the way to the 2024 Summer Games.

They would love to help the U.S. win another team gold. But their target is unquestionably the ice dance title itself.

“It’s going to be a lot more of what it has been — we know what to do, we have our plan and we’re executing,” Chock said. “We don’t plan on deviating from it. We’re going to stick to it. Trust ourselves, trust our team and do what we know to do.”

My New Favorite Olympian will introduce you to Team USA’s most inspiring athletes and the causes they champion. New episodes hosted by Olympic figure skating medalist Adam Rippon and NBC’s Chase Cain will drop January 15. And don’t miss My New Favorite Paralympian beginning March 5!

A dog was found dead on the ice in the Willimantic River on Friday, according to the Willimantic Police Department.

The Windham Animal Control was notified after a report of a small dog lying motionless near the center of the river close to the waterfall.

Emergency personnel responded and found that the dog was already dead and had been laying on a cardboard box on unstable ice.

While the police and fire department worked to create a plan to rescue the dog, the ice broke apart, and the dog was carried downstream.

It is still unknown how the dog ended up in the river, and what the causes of death were.

Animal control and the Willimantic Police Department are currently investigating the incident and are looking to find out who was involved and how the dog entered the water.

Anyone with information can call the police department at 860-465-3135.

Hartford Police are investigating what led to a skirmish between protestors and possible federal employees during a protest outside a federal building on Thursday.  

The incident, captured on camera, occurred when protestors tried to prevent two vehicles from entering the Abraham A. Ribicoff building on Thursday evening.  

The vehicles, which Hartford officials believe were driven by federal employees, proceeded through the crowd.  

The mayor said a van struck one of the protestors in the process, and a separate person is captured on video smashing the back window of the van as it drove away.  

Separately, also captured on video, an unidentified person, whom the mayor says believes is affiliated with the federal government, is seen spraying pepper spray at the protestors.   

“We will be investigating what appears to be a hit and run incident with pepper spray being used on attendees of the vigil last night,” Mayor Arunan Arulampalam (D-Hartford) said during a press conference Friday at City Hall.  

Arulamapalam said Hartford police will investigate all aspects of the incident, including the driver who allegedly struck the protestor, the individual spraying what appeared to be pepper spray, and the individual who was seen smashing the window. 

They have not identified the driver, the person who was struck, the person who damaged the vehicle, or the person who was pepper-sprayed.

The event was one of many around the country that served as a vigil for Renee Good, the woman shot and killed by ICE in Minneapolis on Wednesday, as well as a protest against ICE.  

“What we saw last night was a peaceful vigil in the city of Hartford turned violent,” said Mayor Arunan Arulampalam, who said around 200 people were in attendance in total.

Debra Cohen, of Wethersfield, said she was at the vigil when she and others learned there was a potential federal van parked behind the Ribicoff building, and they were concerned ICE had someone detained in the vehicle.  

The Department of Homeland Security has not responded to NBC Connecticut’s request for comment. The agency has not said publicly whether the people were ICE agents or employees with any DHS agency, or whether the van was involved in immigration enforcement activities.  

Cohen said she and others went from Main Street to the back side of the building and hoped to block the van from leaving. 

She says people, whom she also believed were federal law enforcement, were “yelling at us to get back. To get back, to get back. We stood our ground. and that’s when the pepper spray came out.” 

Cohen says that the individual then sprayed them from behind the gate.

“It wasn’t so much a taste as a burning that I’ve never felt before,” she said, describing the spray. “It was not only in my eyes, and I seriously couldn’t open my eyes or see anything. It was all on my face, on my lips, which was really, really bad.” 

Video also captured some protestors trying to stop a car in front of the van from leaving the Ribicoff parking lot.  

Both vehicles continue through the crowd, at which point police said the van struck one of the protestors.  

The protestor denied medical attention, according to the City.

Gov. Ned Lamont, (D-Connecticut), said Friday he wants to wait for the investigation before making judgement, but he was critical of some of the protestors.  

Lamont, speaking at a separate press conference at the Legislative Office Building, said protestors who obstruct law enforcement shift the focus.  

“ICE took an open window and shot somebody in the head and shot her dead, and she was an innocent mother of three,” he said. I don’t want anything to distract from that.”  

Lamont pointed to frequent comments from President Donald Trump claiming Democrats and liberal-leaning voters engage in violent protests around the country.  

“You’re doing just what President Trump says,” Lamont said. “There’s a demonstration here in Hartford, a couple of people do what they shouldn’t do. All of a sudden, that distracts. That’s just what he wants.” 

Rep. Vincent Candelora, (R-Minority Leader), said he wanted to hear Lamont us strong language to tell protestors never to obstruct law enforcement.  

“I think we need to draw a hard line on people stepping into traffic and trying to obstruct that traffic,” he said. “We saw what happened in Minnesota, and we don’t want that to happen in Connecticut.”  

Candelora also believes that both sides need to tone down their rhetoric, objecting to how Democrats have talked about ICE and to how Vice President J.D. Vance and others in the Trump administration characterized Good.  

“I don’t like the use of the word terrorist to describe the victim as much as I didn’t like that word used to describe ICE,” he said. “I think that word has been cheapened, and we should be dialing back that rhetoric.”  

Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Connecticut), also speaking at the press conference in the LOB, said he wants an independent review of Good’s death, suggesting a task force of local, state, and federal law enforcement officials.  

He also supported Hartford’s efforts to investigate the conduct of federal agents.  

“There are state laws that apply; state authorities are not without jurisdiction,” he said. “They have authority.”  

Blumenthal separately wants more information on how ICE trains new employees, noting the agency has been hiring at a rapid rate as Trump looks to deliver on his campaign promise of ramped-up deportations.  

Blumenthal is the ranking Democrat on the U.S. Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, which released a report last month about the conduct of ICE agents.  

Specifically, the report details the claims of 22 U.S. citizens who claim they were assaulted, and some detained, by ICE agents.