Courtesy Team USA | Getty Images
It was a series of golden days for American hockey.
On Feb. 19, the U.S. women’s hockey team beat Canada 2-1—in an exciting overtime period—to take the gold medal at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Games. Veteran scorer and captain Hilary Knight scored the Americans’ first goal with just a few minutes left in regulation time, tying things up and bringing the crowd in Milan’s Santagiulia Arena to a fever pitch.
Most observers agreed the game could go to either team—to the Americans, who’d been outscoring their opponents 31 to 1 over the course of their 2026 Olympic run, or to the Canadians, a longtime world powerhouse in women’s hockey who’d won the gold medal five of the eight years that women’s hockey has appeared at the Winter Games (the sport debuted in 1998).
It turned out to be the Americans’ year. Four minutes into the overtime period, Megan Keller got the game-winning goal into Canada’s net, and the ice—and the crowd—erupted in a swell of red, white, and blue.
The game was a strong showing for many Minnesota athletes, too. Six members of the Olympic national team play for the PWHL’s Minnesota Frost: Kendall Coyne Schofield, Lee Stecklein, Kelly Pannek, Grace Zumwinkle, Taylor Heise, and Britta Curl-Salemme. Rory Guilday, a Chanhassen native, didn’t play on Thursday but was part of Team USA’s victory in the semifinals; she currently plays for the PWHL’s Ottawa Charge. And young Abbey Murphy, a captain of the University of Minnesota women’s hockey team, rounded out the State of Hockey’s representation in Italy.
“This is definitely the most talented team I’ve ever been on,” Taylor Heise told NBC. “The talent that is in that room is unbelievable.”
Then, just a couple of days later, the U.S. men’s hockey team had a shot at their own gold medal—like the women’s team, they squared off against Canada, the two countries playing against the backdrop of a decades-long rivalry and an Olympic drought for the Americans, who hadn’t won gold in the men’s hockey final since the historic 1980 “Miracle on Ice” game.
But, just like the women, the men won the game in a close overtime period. The Minnesota Wild’s Matt Boldy scored the first regular-time goal, getting the puck around Canadian goalie Jordan Binnington. At minute 38, the Canadians scored to tie the game. And it was just 101 seconds into overtime that young Jack Hughes—brother of another Minnesota Wild Olympian, Quinn Hughes—came through with the golden goal.
In addition to Boldy and Quinn Hughes, the medal-winning American team boasted other Minnesota talent: the Wild’s Brock Faber; Warroad native Brock Nelson, who plays for the NHL’s Colorado Avalanche; Woodbury’s Jake Guentzel, who plays for the Tampa Bay Lightning; Lakeville’s Jake Oettinger, who plays for the Dallas Stars; and Eden Prairie’s Jackson LaCombe, who plays for the Anaheim Ducks.
After the game, Quinn Hughes spoke with reporters about his younger brother’s golden goal. “I’m just proud, obviously,” Quinn said. “He’s gone through a lot, with two shoulder surgeries, and he just loves the game more than anyone and all he wants to do is be healthy and play. And I think in this tournament he showed he’s one of the best players in the world, clearly, and just persevering at such a young age.”
