Stellato-Dudek and Deschamps defend Skate Canada pairs title [Video]

Reigning pairs world champions Deanna Stellato-Dudek and Maxime Deschamps of Canada captured their second consecutive Skate Canada title by finishing second in Saturday’s free skate final.

The Canadian duo took Friday’s short programme with 73.23 points and scored 124.10 points from judges in the free skate at Halifax, Nova Scotia.

That was enough to give them gold with a total of 197.33 points ahead of Uzbekistan’s Ekaterina Geynish and Dmitrii Chigirev, who topped the free skate with 126.12 points.

That lifted the Uzbek duo, fourth after the short programme, into second overall on 189.65 with Australians Anastasia Golubeva and Hektor Giotopoulos Moore third overall on 186.14.

Reigning world champion Ilia Malinin of the United States led the men’s short programme earlier Saturday with a superb performance.

Malinin, who won a third consecutive Skate America title last week, took the opening skate with 106.22 points with Japan’s Shun Sato second on …