The conventional wisdom, which lifelong Tara supporters are totally free to gloat about because they never believed the "hype", was that if Kwan skated cleanly and well, she would have won because Tara couldn't compete against her second mark no matter how she skated.
And that was the case at 1997 Worlds (Kwan doubled the lutz too) and 1998 Nationals. Even in the short at the Olympics, Kwan got 5.9s across the board and Lipinski got only 1 5.9 and the rest 5.8s with some 5.7s and even 1 5.6.