Stephen Nedoroscik Survives Semifinals & Moves Onto Finale Of ‘Dancing With The Stars’
Stephen Nedoroscik has made it to the finals, folks.
Nedoroscik and his partner Rylee Arnold returned to screens for the semifinals of “Dancing with the Stars” on Tuesday night after finishing in third last week. The pair received two 10s and earned 54 points on the night.
This week, the couples had two separate dances again to get the highest score and win fan votes to move on to the finals.
In the rehearsal video, the pair, also known as Arnold-Pommel, shared they will be dancing a cha-cha to “Bailar.” Last week, judge Derek Hough talked about the many different sides of Nedoroscik seen throughout the season after he shined with his vulnerability in the dance.
“In gymnastics, you don’t have an emotional performance. It’s just being vulnerable in that dance. It still makes me feel emotion as I watch it,” Nedoroscik said. “To get to this point, it’s been so much work, the unbelievable amount of work that I put in, and I’m just proud of everything that I’ve done, and I want to see this journey continue.”
Arnold called on Nedoroscik to be “a spicy, sexy Steve” this week for the Latin dance. She was focusing on his timing and making sure his legs and hips were working together to execute a perfect cha-cha, but Nedoroscik struggled with the steps.
“I’m definitely just not learning as fast as I typically do,” Nedoroscik said. “It really hurts me when I mess up my steps, and I can see it affecting her. I might be showing you dances right now, but I’m not going to let that shake my confidence. I’m determined to be ready for the semifinal.”
The dance opened with the pair standing single file towards the back of the floor, as Nedoroscik threw his glasses aside. Two background dancers stood on the sides of Nedoroscik as Arnold was behind and they swayed to the music before he dipped the extras.
Nedoroscik danced with both of the extras for a short time, smiling, before connecting with Arnold and locking in. Arnold immediately went down into a split as Nedoroscik held her shoulders before she came back up. The pair moved to the beat together and then spun out.
As the music crescendoed, Arnold dropped to a squat before climbing back up as Nedoroscik dipped her to both sides. He half-lunged as she twirled out and they shuffle stepped around the floor. The pair let go before clapping and mirroring each other moves to the beat before coming back together as Arnold spun around in front of him and swayed him from side to side.
Arnold dipped down, and Nedoroscik grabbed her hand and leg and she kicked around his head before falling into a split. She jumped right back up and the cha-cha steps returned before Nedoroscik slid toward the front of the stage while pointing at the camera while Arnold ran behind. He dipped her as the song ended and confetti exploded to loud cheers from the audience.
Hough started off the judge’s comments, sharing that he thought the dance got the better of Nedoroscik.
“Stephen, I love you,” Hough said. “I love you so much. It’s hard not to root for everything that you do. However, I feel like this dance got a little bit of the better of you. I mean some bent legs and heel leads. But here’s the best part, you have a second dance tonight. Show us you deserve to be in those finals, I believe in you.”
“The cheeky, the funny side, it was like watching a kid in a candy store. Not quite Ricky Martin yet, but you capture the feel of the dance, you get everybody to enjoy, you get everybody into a party mode. You work very, very hard. He’s absolutely right, you have to work a bit harder,” judge Bruno Tonioli said.
Arnold-Pommel received two eights and one nine after the mixed review performance for 25 points on their first dance.
The pair returned for a ballroom-style dance with a Tango to “Sweet Disposition” with Nedoroscik saying he hoped to tap into his Olympic mindset in the rehearsal video.
“The inner athlete in me is screaming that I gotta make the finale. So my strategy going forward is to tap into what I did at the Olympic Games. No holding back,” Nedoroscik said.
Arnold said Nedoroscik has an advantage with the tango over the cha-cha because of his upper body strength. He can use that to his advantage and the pair felt more confident in his framework.
“When I’m in competition mode, I spend every waking second of the day dedicated to making sure that performance is the best it can be,” Nedoroscik said. “Now, it’s time to really lock in. The last few months have been nothing short of amazing, and I’m not stopping now. I won an Olympic medal, and now I’m coming for that mirror ball.”
Nedoroscik put his glasses on to start the dance for a change as Arnold approached behind him and joined hands to strut onto the floor. They spun together, hitting half lunges and dips as they moved across the floor with high kicks.
Arnold twirled as they strutted across the stage, and Nedoroscik lost his glasses at some point as the music picked up and the pair mirrored each other, reaching up to the sky and taking confident strides to reunite.
Nedoroscik spun Arnold around before they strutted again, as he led the whole time. The pair spun across the stage together as the Penn State gymnast dipped Arnold as the song ended.
After the dance ended, Nedoroscik said the glasses flew off by accident, so host Alfonso Ribeiro ran to grab them as Toniolo kicked off the comments.
“You can breathe. Mission to tango accomplished!” Tonioli exclaimed. “You were so honest, you were strong, you were trying your best. You were really concentrating on trying to get the timing right. You were even doing the crescendo section I could tell you were like, ‘I want to do this, I want to do this,’ and you did it.”
Judge Carrie Ann Inaba emphasized the skill Nedoroscik has to perform without his glasses each week, and even more on Tuesday as his glasses were half on his face.
“The way you were able to do that with your glasses like that, that throws off your depth perception worse than already you’re going through. I’m so impressed you didn’t stop. You did something that not many people could do. You continued on, and you led her through that dance,” Inaba said.
Hough echoed the comments, sharing that the dance was impressive, triumphant, and made up for the cha-cha.
Arnold-Pommel headed to the skybox where they received a 10 from Inaba and nines from Hough and Tonioli for 28 points.
The two dances combined put them at 53 points out of 60 for the night, sitting in last place going into the last commercial break, leaving them hopeful for fan votes to push them to the finals.
Arnold-Pommel was one of two couples left alongside rugby star Ilona Maher hoping to make it to the finals. To everyone’s surprise, the hosts announced no couple would go home and everyone would move on to the finals.
Tune in again next week to see if Nederoscik and Arnold win the coveted Mirrorball trophy, folks.
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