Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger, dancing partner Derek Hough win 'Dancing With the Stars' title

LOS ANGELES — The Pussycat Doll is now the "Dancing With the Stars" champ.

Nicole Scherzinger and partner Derek Hough dominated throughout the 10th season of the hit ABC show and bested Olympic gold medalist Evan Lysacek to win the "Dancing" crown Tuesday night.

"I feel like I just won a Grammy," she said after the show. "A dancing Grammy!"

Scherzinger performed a high-energy jive as her final dance that earned a perfect score of 30 and inspired head judge Len Goodman to say, "There can only be one winner of 'Dancing With the Stars.' It should be you."

Lysacek's quickstep also earned the judges' praise, but just 28 points.

"It's been such a blast," the champion figure skater said. "We are totally satisfied with everything we gave. We're so proud of Nicole and Derek. They deserve it. ... They inspired all the other couples in the competition."

Scherzinger and Hough kissed the mirrorball trophy as they were hoisted on the shoulders of other dancers.

"Win or lose tonight, I was just very, very happy with the entire season," said Hough, a two-time "Dancing" champ. "To get the trophy at the end of it, that was just amazing."

Even more valuable than the trophy, Scherzinger said, were the personal lessons she learned during the season.

"This has been probably the greatest reward personally, this whole personal journey," she said. "I've learned so much about myself. I've learned so much about Derek Hough. He's made me a better person through this."

She added that she plans to work on winning a real Grammy now that her "Dancing" stint is done.

Lysacek said he hopes to bring some of his new performance skills onto the ice. And though he thought the winning couple "were the best dancers by a mile from the very first night," he said his competitive spirit pushed him to do better each week.

"I came into this competition and said, 'I'm not going to be competitive, I'm just going to have fun,'" he said after the show. "And the further we got from the Olympics, the more my competitive fire started burning. ... It progressed, and slowly but surely I became more confident as a performer and a dancer."

ESPN sportscaster Erin Andrews, the third finalist, and her professional partner Maksim Chmerkovskiy were eliminated from the dance-off halfway through the two-hour season closer.