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Sporting News, The, March 7, 1994 by Michael Knisley

Taken in toto, figure skating had a rough couple of weeks in Lillehammer. But the long-term damage, if any, will be negligible, especially after skating's systematic purge of Harding. The legal proceedings back in the States in all likelihood will keep her out of the World Championships later this month in Chiba, Japan. The best guess -- maybe it's more a hope -- is that her competitive days are finished.

"I think despite it all, the sport is going to remain mystifying to young children," Wylie says. "I think the whole activity of skating on ice is always a little bit mystifying, in its own way. I don't think anybody or anything can ever take away that power. It's a really neat human, cultural activity. I mean, it's kind of weird. You take a tool. You strap a blade to your skate. You go out on the ice and you perform all sorts of maneuvers that you couldn't do without the frictionless surface.

"To a little child, they see the beautiful women skating out there and they see the jumps and everything else, and they are very, very excited. And it is very, very exciting. That's not going to go away."

Because like life, figure skating goes on.

Michael Knisley is a senior writer for The Sporting News.