As if Ohio State and Minnesota weren't challenges enough, Wisconsin will chase a ninth women's hockey championship without some of its best players.
MADISON – As if WCHA rivals Ohio State and Minnesota weren’t tough enough obstacles, the Wisconsin women’s hockey team will face another big one throughout 2025-26: Team USA.
The Badgers have some of the best players in the country, players who deserve the opportunity to represent the United States in international competition.
But the biggest international competition – the 2026 Winter Olympics – will likely take the best of the Badgers' best away for a significant portion of the heart of the season as UW chases its second straight national championship, fifth in seven years and ninth overall.
“I’m excited because it presents a new challenge for the coaching staff and how you’re going to deal with this and how you’re going to manage it,” coach Mark Johnson said.
“And from a player’s perspective, especially the third week of January till almost the end of February … if we’re healthy those kids are going to play and their minutes are going to be ramped up quite a bit.”
Wisconsin opens its season with a pair of games Sept. 26-27 at Bemidji State and then hangs its latest national championship banner Oct. 3 at LaBahn Arena before the first game of a pair against Maine.
Final Olympic rosters have not been set, but the Badgers could be without as many as six players. That includes their top four returning scorers – defender Caroline Harvey and forwards Lacy Eden, Laila Edwards and Kirsten Simms – as well as Ava McNaughton, the reigning goaltender of the year, plus newcomer Adéla Šapovalivová, a forward from Czechia.
In part to deal with the absences, the Badgers’ leadership group consists of five players for the season, with Harvey as captain and then Eden, Edwards, forward Kelly Gorbatenko and defender Marianne Picard as alternate captains.
Beyond Gorbatenko and Picard, Johnson also pointed to junior Cassie Hall (a 20-goal scorer in 2024-25), sophomores Finley McCarthy and Hannah Halverson and freshman Charlotte Pieckenhagen as a few of the players who could be in a good position to step up.
“We’re going to need those kids as we go through the first part of the season also,” Johnson said.
“And then, like any other thing, life happens. Games happen. Things that we might not be prepared for are going to happen. So the big thing is we’re aware of it, we understand it and then we’re just going to have to make the best of the situation we’re in at that particular time.”
This is the first time players involved in the Olympic selection process and Games also will play NCAA games. Previously, including when Johnson stepped away from UW for a year to coach the 2010 Olympic team, players committed for the Olympics missed their college seasons. The committment will test the student-athletes physically and mentally.
“It’s definitely going to be a challenge but it’s one that we can handle,” Edwards said. “It’ll be important to just take care of our bodies and don’t overdo it. We’re always wanting to get better, but sometimes a way of getting better is taking rest, taking time off because traveling and all the skates back and forth between USA and Wisconsin, it’s going to do a lot on our bodies.”
Players already have missed a chunk of UW’s preparations to be with Team USA, and Johnson isn’t sure exactly how much time he should expect them to be gone, although it’s shaping up as the better part of a week about once a month. Then there’ll be training camp in Italy before the Olympics, which run from Feb. 5-19. In all it could add up to about one-third of the season Wisconsin will be without its best players.
The first weekend in that span Wisconsin is scheduled to host Ohio State, its opponent in the past three national championship games. The Badgers subsequently play at Minnesota State and host St. Cloud State.
“They’ll be salivating,” Johnson said. “Go to Mankato and play St Cloud, it’s like, ‘Wisconsin, all right, we’re gonna get them this time.’
“Then it’s like, OK, as I’ve always said, then Monday comes. You gotta keep going, right? Don’t look back.”
It’s difficult to downplay the effect of turnover when those lost include the program’s all-time leading scorer and latest Patty Kazmaier Award winner, first-line center Casey O’Brien, but the departures could have been worse.
Forward Sarah Wozniewicz played in all 41 games, scoring nine goals with 12 assits in 2024-25. Defender Katie Kozlowski was fifth on the team in blocked shots in her final season and contributed nine assists. Goaltender Quinn Kuntz started two games and played in four in her one year after transferring from Ohio State.
“We’ve got a good mix of some young (players), veteran experience, just different ages and differing levels of experience,” Harvey said. “But it’s the same level of hunger, nonetheless. And the girls are ready to go, whether they’re freshmen or it’s their fifth go-round, you can feel that excitement, that energy in the locker room.”
Of all the problems Wisconsin might face in what promises to be a challenging season, complacency shouldn’t be one of them.
Some of the Badgers have celebrated two NCAA championships, while newcomers are eager to experience their first. All are at UW because they know the expectations and rewards.
“I think the identity of the squad is going to be relentlessness,” said Edwards, the top goal scorer in the country last season.
“It’s going to be an interesting year. Our team isn’t going to look the same throughout the whole year, but just playing through it and playing to our identity is going to be huge for us. No matter who’s in the lineup and who isn’t, we’re going to be a very hard team to beat.”
This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Wisconsin women's hockey challenged by Olympics in NCAA title defense
Category: General Sports
