NAGANO, Japan -- Olympic women's figure skating comes down to this: There is Michelle, there is Tara, and there really is nobody else.

Sure, something could go wrong for Michelle Kwan or Tara Lipinski in Friday's showpiece, the free skate. More likely, everything will go right for both American teen-agers, one skating off with gold, the other with silver.

Can Tara Lipinski score high enough to overtake fellow American Michelle Kwan for the gold? (AP)

"YOU EXPECT THEM TO SKATE PERFECTLY," said Rosalyn Sumners, the 1984 Olympic silver medalist, "and they do."

Kwan knows all about perfection, earning 15 6.0s out of 36 marks at last month's U.S. championships. She leads heading into the finale, worth two-thirds of the total score.

Right behind is Lipinski, who chased Kwan in 1996 when Kwan won nationals and worlds, then passed her last year, when Lipinski won everything in sight.

This season, the 17-year-old Kwan surged back ahead, despite a two-month layoff from competition with a stress fracture in her left foot. The injury actually might have helped her, because she returned for nationals in excellent shape and with a renewed determination and passion for skating.

Lipinski, in turn, discovered what it's like to be the hunted. She's lost in both meetings with Kwan -- at Skate America and the U.S. championships -- but won the Champions Series final when Kwan was injured.

Their performances in the short program emphasized how far they have risen above the field that includes third-place Maria Butyrskaya and fifth-place Irina Slutskaya of Russia, fourth-place Lu Chen of China, and their distraught American teammate, Nicole Bobek.

Bobek followed her disastrous 17th-place finish in the short with a sorry practice session in which she fell a dozen times and left seven minutes early. The tears flowed once again for the U.S. bronze medalist, but she vowed to skate Friday night.

Not for gold, though. Barring a shocking upset, that will go either to Kwan or her 15-year-old rival.

"Winning would be more than anything I ever imagined," Lipinski said. "I think I would be content with everything after that."

And would the silver be acceptable?

"If I skate great, yeah. But I do want to go out there and try to win," she said.

"WHEN YOU CONSIDER MICHELLE AND TARA," added Frank Carroll, who coaches Kwan, "they both have been gold and silver medalists already. They both know the taste of winning.

"You are going to win some, going to lose some, and if you can't cope with that, can't live with that, you are in the wrong sport."

The other challengers picked the wrong year to be in the Olympics if they held dreams of gold.

Kwan is more stylish, her skating more refined, her programs better choreographed than anyone's. The jumps seem to come effortlessly for her, and no one can recall more memorable spirals and layback spins.

Lipinski's enthusiasm is contagious. She's technically masterful and her artistry is rapidly developing. She does more difficult jumps -- including her trademark triple loop-triple loop combination and now a triple toe loop-half loop-triple salchow -- than Kwan and most of the other women. And she nearly always lands them.

Best of all, the two youngsters force each other to stretch the boundaries of their performances. Not vocally -- they are cordial, though not friends -- nor in any other external way. But just by being there.

"IT'S GOOD TO HAVE SOMEONE PUSHING YOU, because it makes you work hard to be better," Lipinski said. "It's another challenge for you.''

The biggest challenge for both comes Friday night. It's a distinct possibility Kwan and Lipinski will remain Olympic-eligible through Salt Lake City in 2002, but neither wants to wait four years for a gold medal.

"An Olympic silver medal is great," said Richard Callaghan, Lipinski's coach. "The gold is better."