Find a better women’s hockey team than the 2026 USA squad – you can’t

To some, perfection may be a far-fetched concept.

Maybe it’s too hard to reach. Being great at every second can become tiresome, leaving the mentally strongest in the world to falter.

Well, the 2026 United States women’s Olympic hockey team was as close as you could get to perfection on sport’s biggest stage.

The Americans beat rival Canada in the gold medal game in Milan on Thursday, with Megan Keller’s highlight-reel goal in overtime giving the team its third Olympic championship, and first since 2018.

It capped off a dominant performance by a team that has been growing into an unstoppable force for the past few years. Under head coach John Wroblewski, the healthy combination of veterans who have been there and done that has meshed with a young and hungry core of talent to become one of the best assemblies of talent ever, and it has culminated in one of the most impressive performances in the history of women’s hockey at the Winter Games.

The team went a perfect 7-0, the first time the U.S. went undefeated in women’s hockey since the inaugural tournament in 1998. They gave up just two goals, matching the tournament record set by Canada in Vancouver in 2010 and Turin four years earlier. However, unlike the yesteryear of women’s Olympic hockey, the overall level of talent of this year’s tournament was enormously higher.

Sure, these Americans didn’t boast a +48 goal differential like Canada did in 2006 (or the +47 differential from Beijing four years ago), but against teams that have expotentially improved over the years, the U.S. showed its dominance by simply being better in every single game.

In all of their games combined, the U.S. outshot their opponents, 292-126, outscoring the competition 33-2 on their way to the gold. They gave up their first goal against Czechia in the tournament opener on Feb. 5, but didn’t give up another until the gold medal game against their hated rivals. The team didn’t give up a goal for 352:17 of game time, an Olympic record. Aerin Frankel became the first female goaltender to deliver three shutouts in a single Winter Games. She probably would’ve had more if she weren’t platooned with reigning PWHL Playoff MVP, Gwyneth Philips.

While USA had mainstays like captain Hilary Knight, Alex Carpenter, and Kendall Coyne Schofield, it also had a strong core of youngsters hungry to excel on the Olympic stage. Defender Caroline Harvey became the star attraction in Milan, earning praise from the U.S. men’s team and others around the Olympic village. The University of Wisconsin standout had a sensational performance, finishing tied with teammate Megan Keller with nine points in the tournament. Harvey was named the tournament’s best defender and most valuable player as a result.

She wasn’t the only Badger who shone in these Winter Games. Laila Edwards, the forward-turned-defender, finished tied for third in scoring with eight points in seven games and became the first black American to win a medal in Olympic history.

Then there were Abbey Murphy and Hannah Bilka, two skilled players with vastly different personalities. Yet they both stepped up when their team needed them, each scoring 7 points in the tournament.

Even with the rise in blossoming stars, the “old guard” still performed. Carpenter quietly scored three goals and six points, while Coyne Schofield and Hayley Scamurra each had three points. Knight also set the record for goals and points scored by an American at the Olympics.

This was legitimately the best combination of players the game has ever seen in women’s hockey at the Olympics, maybe in all of the Winter Games. You have, at least, four future Hall of Famers in Knight, Coyne Schofield, Keller and Carpenter, with players like Frankel and Taylor Heise carving out resumes that will most certainly lead them to be enshrined in Toronto as well. Then, you have the youngsters who will carry the torch for well over another decade, including Philps, Kirsten Simms and Joy Dunne.

Try to find holes in this lineup. But, as teams learned over the past two weeks in Milan and the months leading up to the Games, its nearly impossible.

Sure, eventually, a team might come out and beat the Americans, claiming the top spot on the podium as Olympic champions. However, it’ll be difficult to find a group of athletes that has come together and dictated the sport of hockey the way the 2026 U.S. Women’s Olympic team did.