‘Somebody’s coming back with a gold:’ Panthers’ Olympians ‘thrilled’ to represent home countries
Matthew Tkachuk vividly remembers watching T.J. Oshie will the United States to a shootout win against Russia, a preliminary round victory in the 2014 Winter Olympics that helped pave the way to the Americans reaching the bronze medal game but ultimately just miss the podium.
That was the last time NHL players took part in the Olympic Games.
“It seems like forever ago,” Tkachuk said. “There’s a lot of players who have missed out on this for a lot of years.”
A dozen years have come and gone. Two Olympic cycles passed without some of the world’s top hockey players participating in the top international tournament for their sport.
Finally, they’re back.
NHL players are in Milan for the 2026 Winter Olympics, their first time since those 2014 Games.
It’s a long time coming for a lot of the NHL’s superstars who have bided their time for this opportunity — and one they aren’t taking for granted now that they’re back. The men’s tournament begins Wednesday with two games: Slovakia vs. Finland and Sweden vs. Italy. The gold medal game is Feb. 22.
“I think regardless if we went every four years, every 12 years, you’re just so excited for that moment,” said veteran forward Brad Marchand, who will play for Canada. “It’s something that is very rare. You play a long time in the NHL; it doesn’t mean you’re given that opportunity. It really is the only best-on-best tournament that you get to see every kind of country on display. Even just everything else: the history behind it, everything else that surrounds it, all the other sports. There’s so much that goes into it that makes it so unique and special. We’re all so excited and thrilled to be part of it again.”
And the Panthers will be well-represented in Milan.
The team has an NHL-leading 10 players participating in the Olympic Games, representing five countries. Tkachuk is playing for the United States; Sam Bennett, Marchand and Sam Reinhart for Canada; Anton Lundell, Eetu Luostarinen and Niko Mikkola for Finland; Gustav Forsling for Sweden; and Uvis Balinskis and Sandis Vilmanis for Latvia. Two others — Aleksander Barkov (Finland) and Seth Jones (United States) — were named as Olympians but are not participating due to injuries.
Beyond the players, the Panthers have five others representing the franchise in Italy, with president of hockey operations and general manager Bill Zito plus head equipment manager Teddy Richards serving as part of the Team USA staff while three assistant coaches — Tuomo Ruutu (Finland), Myles Fee (Sweden) and Jamie Kompon (Germany) — are representing their respective countries, as well.
“Somebody’s coming back with a gold medal,” Panthers coach Paul Maurice said. “There’s going to be at least one guy really, really happy in our group and on our staff. ... It’s gonna be a good day here. We’ll just talk to the guys that won.”
And for each of the Panthers set to play on the biggest stage over the next two weeks, the story of how they are representing their countries parallels to how they represent the Panthers and the trajectories of their careers.
United States: Tkachuk at the forefront
Front and center on the United States’ roster is Tkachuk, who has become one of the faces of the NHL since the Panthers acquired him in a blockbuster trade with the Calgary Flames ahead of the 2022-23 season.
Florida has reached the Stanley Cup Final each of Tkachuk’s first three seasons with the team, including winning each of the past two years.
Now, Tkachuk is hoping to lead the United States to its third gold in men’s hockey and first since 1980.
And nothing was going to stop him from this opportunity. He timed his offseason surgery to repair a torn adductor muscle and sports hernia sustained during last season’s 4 Nations Face-Off to ensure he would be back playing with enough time to be ready to go for the Olympics.
Tkachuk, who is an alternate captain for the United States, certainly knows how to provide a spark when he needs to. His agitating style of play gets under opponents’ skin, and then he backs it up by producing on the statsheet as well — he has 262 points (91 goals, 171 assists) in 221 regular-season games with the Panthers to go along with 69 points (25 goals, 44 assists) in 67 Stanley Cup playoff games. He’s projected to be on a forward line with his brother Brady Tkachuk and Jack Eichel.
“It’s really an exciting time to be an American hockey player,” Tkachuk said, “just to be able to go represent our country again and hopefully do what our country hasn’t done in 40-plus years.”
Canada: Setting the standard amid pressure
The Canadians won that 2014 Olympics that most recently featured NHL players. It was Canada’s ninth Olympic gold in men’s ice hockey.
It’s also the last time the Canadians were atop the podium.
This year, they come in as the heavy favorite with a star-studded lineup filled with All-Stars, MVPs and surefire Hall of Famers.
Three Panthers players in Bennett, Marchand and Reinhart look to aid Canada in its gold-or-bust journey.
It’s each players’ first time playing in the Olympics, but all three were with Canada for its run in the 4 Nations Face-Off last year that ended in gold. All three have also won multiple Stanley Cups — Bennett and Reinhart winning each of the past two years with Florida, Marchand winning in 2011 with Boston and last season with Florida — and all seem to elevate their game when the stakes are highest.
This season, they all have stepped up for Florida as the team dealt with a slew of injuries. Reinhart and Marchand are the Panthers’ top goal scorers and point producers, while Bennett is playing a career high in minutes and has filled up the scoresheet over the past two months after a slow start to the season.
“We know how much hockey means to Canadians, and we take that with a lot of pride,” Bennett said. “So you don’t think about the pressure, you just think about the pride of putting on that jersey. And there’s a lot of proud players on our team.”
Added Reinhart: “We have an opportunity to represent a whole country that’s behind us, and we’re prepared to carry that burden. Hopefully our performance validates why we were selected to represent our country.”
Finland: Playing for Barkov
The Finns are the defending Olympic champions, winning their first ever gold in 2022, but the team this year is likely fourth best in terms of talent behind Canada, the United States and Sweden.
The fact that they’re without one of their most critical players in Barkov — a loss the Panthers have been feeling all season — doesn’t help things.
Barkov, the Panthers’ captain and a three-time Selke Trophy winner as the NHL’s top defensive forward, has not played this season while recovering from surgery to repair the ACL and MCL in his right knee from an injury sustained at the start of training camp. Barkov was almost assuredly going to be Finland’s captain like he was in the 4 Nations Face-Off and give the Finns oodles of talent at the top of their forward group.
But in his absence, the Finns are powering forward even against long odds.
“We do everything we can to make him proud,” Lundell said, “because he’s been a guy who has held up this franchise for over the last decade. Injuries happen, but we all want to make sure we do our job, and we play well and make him proud.”
Lundell and Luostarinen are projected to be two-thirds of Finland’s third forward line along with Kappo Kakko or Oliver Kapanen. Mikkola is slotted as part of the country’s second defense pairing with Rasmus Ristolainen.
“It’s a huge honor,” Lundell said. “It’s the biggest tournament in my life. To be able to represent my own country and be proud to be a Finn, it’s gonna be awesome.”
Sweden: Forsling’s rise for club and country
The most recent Winter Olympics in Italy was good to the Swedes, who won their second and most recent gold medal during the 2006 Games in Turin.
They’re hoping to potentially play spoiler this year after only making the podium once in the past four Olympics — notching silver during the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
“The whole event is going to be amazing,” Forsling said. “It’s something you always dream about.”
Forsling, who leads all healthy Panthers this season in average time on ice per game (22:41) will play a key role on Sweden’s blue line. The 29-year-old went through practices in Milan working as part of Sweden’s top defense pair with Rasmus Dahlin.
It’s the latest marker of how far Forsling has come since being claimed off waivers by the Panthers ahead of the 2020-21 season, the Panthers’ first under Zito. Through past five-and-a-half seasons, Forsling has become one of the NHL’s top defensive defensemen, able to compete with the best the NHL has to offer.
Latvia: Up and comers leading an up-and-coming country
Latvia doesn’t have the pedigree that some of the other countries have.
But the nation is on the rise in the hockey world — and Florida’s two representatives on the team in Balinskis and Vilmanis epitomize that.
Panthers’ scouts found Balinskis in the senior league in the Czech Republic ahead of the 2022-23 season. He has been a steady presence on Florida’s blue line ever since, working from a sporadic option in the lineup to this season proving he can handle second-pair duties and run the power play.
Vilmanis, a fifth-round pick in 2022, made his NHL debut last month and has shown in a small sample size that he is a player with size who can be a depth-scoring forward who also brings physicality to his game.
They are two of just seven Latvians currently in the NHL and two of only 30 who have ever played in the NHL.
Yet while Latvia’s overall hockey success is relatively limited compared to other powerhouse countries, the small nation is on the upswing. It won a bronze medal at the 2023 IIHF World Championship and has seen its junior national team reached the quarterfinals of the world championships each of the past three years. Alberts Smits, a highly touted Latvian defenseman prospect, has the chance this summer to be the second-ever Latvian player to be selected in the first round of the NHL Draft.
“Us winning a bronze medal a couple of years ago, I think our team is getting better every year, and our players are getting better every year,” Balinskis said. “More and more guys signed with NHL teams, and I think players from Latvia are just getting better every year. I think it helps the national team and us to compete with the best teams in the world.”
The tournament format
The 12 countries are split into three, four-team groups. Those groups will play round-robin style, with each team facing the other three in its group, for the first round. The Olympic tournament uses the three-point system for games — three points for a win in regulation, two for a win in overtime or a shootout, one for a loss in overtime or a shootout and zero for a regulation loss.
Afterward, each team will be ranked one through 12 according to a formula created by the IIHF that factors in a team’s position in its group, total points, goal differential, total goals scored and, if needed, the team’s world ranking.
The rest of the tournament from there is single elimination. The top four teams according to this formula receive a bye into the quarterfinal. The remaining eight teams will play a qualification playoff round to advance to the quarterfinal followed by the semifinals and the medal games.
The schedule
Wednesday, Feb. 11
Slovakia vs. Finland, 10:40 a.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Sweden vs. Italy, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Thursday, Feb. 12
Switzerland vs. France, 6:10 p.m. (Peacock)
Czechia vs. Canada, 10:40 a.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Latvia vs. United States, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Germany vs. Denmark, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock)
Friday, Feb. 13
Finland vs. Sweden, 6:10 a.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Italy vs. Slovakia, 6:10 a.m. (Peacock)
France vs. Czechia, 10:40 a.m. (Peacock)
Canada vs. Switzerland, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock)
Saturday, Feb. 14
Sweden vs. Slovakia, 6:10 a.m. (Peacock)
Germany vs. Latvia, 6:10 a.m. (Peacock, CNBC)
Finland vs. Italy, 10:40 a.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
United States vs. Denmark, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Sunday, Feb. 15
Switzerland vs. Czechia, 6:10 a.m. (Peacock, CNBC)
Canada vs. France, 10:40 a.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Denmark vs. Latvia, 1:10 p.m. (Peacock, CNBC)
United States vs. Germany, 3:10 p.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Tuesday, Feb. 17
Qualification playoffs — two games at 6:10 a.m., one game each at 10:40 a.m. and 3:10 p.m. (all games on Peacock, with 3:10 p.m. game also on USA Network)
Wednesday, Feb. 18
Quarterfinals — games at 6:10 a.m., 10:40 a.m., 12:10 p.m. and 3:10 p.m. (all games on Peacock, 10:40 a.m. and 12:10 p.m. games also on USA Network, 3:10 p.m. game also on NBC)
Friday, Feb. 20
Semifinals — games at 10:40 a.m. (Peacock and USA Network) and 3:10 p.m. (Peacock and NBC)
Saturday Feb. 21
Bronze medal game, 2:40 p.m. (Peacock, USA Network)
Sunday, Feb. 22
Gold medal game, 8:10 a.m. (Peacock, NBC)
This story was originally published February 10, 2026 at 10:04 AM.
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