Connor Storrie made his debut on Saturday Night Live over the weekend, and Winter Olympic athletes were at the forefront of the show's theme.
The Heated Rivarly star name dropped two-time Olympic gold medalist, Alysa Liu, in a skit on the late-night sketch comedy.
“And as that ice skating girl with the striped hair taught us, you can still be a baddie, even if you’re a little quirked up,” Storrie said.
Liu loved the compliment and reacted by writing, “Period,” on her Instagram Story on Sunday, March 1.
The Bay Area native had a brief pause in her skating career when she retired at 16 but came back two years later. Now that Liu is 20, she has had an impressive comeback to the sport on her own terms. She decided to not to back down from her creative freedom this go around.
“I get to pick my own program music. I get to help with the creative process of the program,” she revealed to 60 Minutes in January. “If I feel like I’m skating too much, I’ll back down. If I feel like I’m not skating enough, I’ll ramp it up. No one’s going to starve me. Tell me what I can and can’t eat.”
Before Liu's gold medal wins, the last woman to win a gold for Team USA in figure skating was Sarah Hughes in 2002.
Connor Storrie introduces both Men's and Women's Hockey Teams
Storrie's callout to Liu was only one of the bigger moments of his debut as he also surprised fans when he brought out members of the USA Men's and Women's hockey teams. SNL brought out the Hughes brothers — Jack and Quinn — from the USA Men's Hockey Team and Hilary Knight and Megan Keller from the USA's Women's Hockey Team amid their controversy.
“It was going to be just us, but we thought we'd invite the guys too,” Storrie said as Keller and Knight walked onto the set where the crowd went into an uproar.
The viral incident between the teams occurred when President Donald Trump invited the men's team to his State of the Union speech over the speakerphone, adding that he had to invite the women too or he would risk being impeached. The players laughed at the statement, which did not go over well with the women's team nor online on social media.
On an appearance on SportsCenter last week, Knight said that the joke was “distasteful and unfortunate.”
The Women's Hockey Team who won gold over the Canada — the men's team followed suit over Canada as well — decided to decline Trump's State of the Union invitation.
“We are sincerely grateful for the invitation extended to our gold medal–winning U.S. Women’s Hockey Team and deeply appreciate the recognition of their extraordinary achievement,” a USA Hockey spokesperson said. “Due to the timing and previously scheduled academic and professional commitments following the Games, the athletes are unable to participate.”
