The 2026 Olympics came to a close last Sunday with a classic men’s hockey gold medal game. A total of sixteen former and current Minnesota Gophers competed on various forms of ice to try and bring home
some medals to Minnesota, and in general it was a pretty great games for the maroon and gold! Below is a recap of how the former and current Gophers did in Milan and Cortina.
Women’s Hockey:
Nine current and former Gophers competed on four different women’s hockey rosters at this year’s games. While two different nations represented by the Gophers made it to the medal round, only one could come away with a medal. Congrats to the USA Women’s Hockey team your 2026 Olympic Gold Medalists!
United States of America
Lee Stecklein—D
Stecklein finished her Olympic games with a pair of assists and had four shots on goal and was a +4 for the games as one of the US shutdown defenders. She won her second gold medal and will return to action with the Minnesota Frost this week.
Kelly Pannek—F
Pannek won her second gold with the US squad. She finished her games with a pair of assists, five shots on goal and a +4 playing mostly third line minutes for the red, white and blue. She will return to action with the Minnesota Frost this week .
Grace Zumwinkle—F
Zumwinkle won her first Olympic Gold in Milan. She ended her games with one assist on 12 shots on goal and a +5 playing generally on the US’s 4th line. She also will return to action with Minnesota Frost this week.
Abbey Murphy—F
Murphy won her first Olympic gold and was the leading Gopher scorer on the US squad. In seven games Murphy recorded seven points on a pair of goals and five assists. She put 18 shots on goal, picked up six penalty minutes and ended the games as a +8 playing with Taylor Heise on the US second line. Murphy returns back to Minneapolis and will try to break the all-time Gophers goal scoring record this Friday when Minnesota faces St. Cloud State in the first round of the WCHA Playoffs.
Taylor Heise—F
Heise made her Olympic debut and came away with a gold medal. She was the second leading Gopher scorer on the team with five points on a pair of goals and three assists and ended the games at +9. No assist was bigger than the full rink length pass that she sent to defender Megan Keller for the gold medal winning goal in overtime against Canada.
Heise now also jumps back into action with the Minnesota Frost this week alongside Stecklein, Pannek and Zumwinkle.
Sweden
The Swede team went from needing a last second goal just to qualify for the Olympics to running through Group B undefeated and making it all the way to the Bronze Medal Game where they lost a heartbreaker in overtime to Switzerland.
Grace Bouveng—F
Bouveng finished her second Olympic games with a pair of points on a goal and an assist. She finished her games with a +3. She now returns to join Murphy, Plosiva and Laitinien to try and see if the Gophers can make a run and get back to the Frozen Four.
Czechia
Czechia was competetive in each of their games but could only pick up one win over Finland at their games. A 2-0 Sweden Quarterfinal win over Czechia ended their games.
Natálie Mlýnková—F
Mlýnková recored four points in five games for Czechia at the Olympics. She scored three goals and added an assist ending her games at +2. She now returns to action with Montreal in the PWHL.
Tereza Plosová —F
Plosová scored one goal in her Olympic debut and ended a -2 for the games. She returned to action with the Gophers for their final regular season series against UMD last weekend.
Finland
The Fins picked up just one win at the Olympics in a 3-1 win over eventual Bronze medalist Switzerland. Their games ended in a 1-0 Quarterfinal loss in a rematch with the Swiss.
Nelli Laitinen—D
Laitinen did not record a point for Finland in five games and ended her games with a -3 rating. She also returned to action last weekend for the Gophers.
Men’s Hockey
A trio of Gopher alums represented their countries at the Olympics and all three game home with medals. Not a bad ratio.
United States of America:
The USA went a perfect 6-0 at the Olympics and made things dramatic needing overtime victories over Sweden in the quarterfinals and Canada in the Gold Medal Game, but won the USA’s first men’s hockey gold since the Miracle on Ice in 1980. We just won’t talk about the PR failure they have dug themselves into since the completion of the win over Canada…
Brock Faber—D
Faber won his first Olympic medal helping the US to Gold in his second Olympics. Faber recorded two points including one goal and one assist and ended the tournament with a +7 rating. He will rejoin the Minnesota Wild for their playoff push this week.
Jackson LaCombe—D
LaCombe was an injury replacement for the US squad and never saw the ice in Milan. He earned the easiest Olympic medal he ever will receive! He returns to the Anaheim Ducks as they try to hang onto the last playoff spot in the west in the final six weeks of the season.
Finland:
The Finns shook off a slow start to reel off four straight wins before a heartbreaking 3-2 loss to Canada in the Semifinals. They came back to defeat Slovakia 6-1 to take home a bronze medal.
Eric Haula—F
Haula made his Olympic debut and had the best games of any former Gopher on the men’s side. Haula finished second in scoring for the Finns with six points with three goals and three assists. He ended the tournament with a +4 rating. Haula becomes the first Gopher to win an Olympic medal not with the United States. He returns to the Nashville Predators to try and sneak into the playoffs.
Women’s Curling:
The US Women’s Curling team went on a magical run at the 2026 Olympics. With great play from a trio of former Gophers on the squad in Skip Tabatha Peterson Lovick, Tara Peterson and Taylor Anderson-Heide the US squad picked up a huge win over Switzerland in the round-robin finale to qualify for the medal rounds for just the second time in Olympic history. Unfortunately their magic ran out in losses in a rematch with the Swiss in the Semifinals and a loss to Canada in the Bronze Medal Game to finish in 4th place. Still it was a great run for the US Team!
Men’s Curling:
Danny Kasper, the skip of the US team is a Gopher alum, and with a few upsets early in the tournament it appeared that he might be able to help his team to the medal round. Unfortunately needing a win in their final round-robin game against Great Britain they just could not get any shots to fall and would lose to finish in 5th place.
