The pair's first senior international medal, gold, came at the Ondrej Nepela Memorial in September 1996. Maxiuta/Zhovnirski went on to take bronze at the 1997 World Junior Championships, held in November 1996 in Seoul, South Korea; bronze at the 1998 World Junior Championships in December 1997 in Saint John, New Brunswick, Canada; and silver at the 1997–98 Junior Series Final in March 1998 in Lausanne, Switzerland.