While Americans watched the Super Bowl, China was honed in on Olympic star Eileen Gu

ZHANGJIAKOU, China — While the United States was watching the Super Bowl, China watched its biggest Olympic star — American-born freeskier Eileen Gu — start her bid to win a second gold medal in these Olympic Games.

A late-arriving motorcade snarled the already wicked traffic around the Genting Snow Park venue. Bing Dwen Dwen, the instantly-beloved mascot of these Games, bounced around in the front row of nearly-full stands. Fans of Gu braved minus-seven degree temperatures — minus-23 with the wind chill — and waved flags, clapped and cheered as she led off the 27-woman qualifying at freeski slopestyle.

Gu is quite literally the face of these Olympics. Her image is everywhere in China, present on commercials, billboards and every single shopping bag handed out at the Olympics’ official stores. She's also a flashpoint of geopolitical controversy; raised American but skiing for China, her exact citizenship is a matter of considerable debate.

What’s not up for debate, though, is her skill on the slopes. Gu won freeski’s big air gold medal last week, and has two more events — slopestyle and halfpipe — in which she’s favored to match that mark.

Slopestyle involves a combination of rails and jumps over a long, descending course. Gu began her slopestyle qualifying with a less-than-spectacular initial run, falling off one rail early and failing to cleanly land a jump. The crowd below didn’t care, cheering her every move. She finished that run with a 57.28 rating, good for 11th in the first of two rounds, with the top 12 advancing to the finals.

At almost the exact same time the Rams were shutting down the Bengals’ final, desperate drive, Gu stood at the top of the hill, knowing she needed to land a clean run. Several of her rivals had fallen in the first round, and an 11th-place finish was unlikely to hold up.

Gu began her run, and the volume of the crowd dropped from passionate to silent. Hundreds of Chinese fans watched her run on the large-screen television at the base of the hill. This time, though, Gu had no troubles, sequencing cleanly through the pipes and jumps. She totaled two 900s — 2 1/2 rotations — and a 720 cork, a flip that included two rotations.

At the base of the hill, she munched on a bun while waiting for her score: 79.83, good enough for third place and a clean path into the finals.

“Qualifiers are always scarier for me than the finals,” Gu said afterward. “Finals, the pressure’s off. I just go do my thing.”

As it turned out, Gu’s first score wouldn’t have held up; had she not landed her second run cleanly, she would have finished the qualifying session in 16th place. But she’s on to the finals on Tuesday, with a clear chance at a second straight gold.

From Team USA, Maggie Voisin qualified fourth and Marin Hamill qualified sixth. Darian Stevens failed to qualify, and Caroline Claire did not compete.