With NHL players returning to the Olympic Games in 2026 in Milan, the stakes have never been higher for the 12-team tournament. USA coach Mike Sullivan has described the competition as “intense,” and team general manager Bill Guerin has made it clear that there will be no letup in the pursuit of a first gold since 1980.
The Olympic ice hockey game was introduced in 1920 and, until 1956, teams from Canada dominated the event with six straight gold medals. The Soviet Union entered the tournament in 1956, and its superior skill set portended a 36-year reign of dominance. After the breakup of the Soviet Union, teams from Canada and then later Sweden regained their previous positions as the world’s top teams.
The most dramatic moment in Olympic hockey came in the semifinals of the 1980 Lake Placid Olympics, a game immortalized as the Miracle on Ice. Trailing by a goal with two seconds remaining, the U.S.’ Dave Christian, son of the 1960 Olympic gold medal winner Bill Christian, sent a slap shot in the direction of Soviet goalie Vladimir Tretiak. The puck hit the crossbar, bounced over the goal line and fell into the net. The game ended 4-3 in favor of the Americans, who went on to win their first Olympic hockey gold since 1968.
In the years that followed, a number of changes were made to the tournament, most notably in 1998 in Nagano, where women’s ice hockey was introduced and teams could use NHL players. In Vancouver in 2010, ice surfaces were standardised to NHL dimensions, a choice that was repeated at Beijing in 2022 and scheduled for Milano Cortina in 2026.
