In the days after she scored the golden goal for the U.S. women’s hockey team at the Milan Olympics, Megan Keller knew the plan was for her to appear on “Saturday Night Live.” But it hadn’t really sunk in until she was on a call with the comedy icon who created the show in 1975. “I think it hit me when Lorne Michaels wanted to hop on the phone with us,” Keller said in an interview with The Athletic. “It’s been a whirlwind, that’s for sure.” Her opening monologue moment, which she shared with Tea
“I think it hit me when Lorne Michaels wanted to hop on the phone with us,” Keller said in an interview with The Athletic. “It’s been a whirlwind, that’s for sure.”
Her opening monologue moment, which she shared with Team USA captain Hilary Knight and NHL stars Jack and Quinn Hughes, capped a near two-week run that saw Keller go from a crucial — though somewhat underrated — part of the U.S. women’s national team to one of the faces of the sport in the United States.
Keller’s goal in overtime against Team Canada secured the gold medal for Team USA in Milan — the Americans’ first since 2018 — and punctuated a dominant run by the team. For Keller, the goal, a great one-on-one effort against Canadian defender Claire Thompson, is still a bit of a blur.
She remembers receiving the stretch pass from Taylor Heise, skating up ice, and seeing the puck bounce across the line behind Canadian goalie Ann-Renée Desbiens.
“I couldn’t chuck my gloves off fast enough,” she said. “Couldn’t hug (Abbey Murphy) and (Tessa Janecke) fast enough. … I’ll never forget it.”
The women’s team stayed in Milan for the men’s gold medal game — which also went to overtime against Canada — and the closing ceremony. When Keller returned to Boston, where she plays in the Professional Women’s Hockey League, the spotlight on the sport had intensified. She went on “The Pat McAfee Show,” among several media appearances, and played in front of a sold-out crowd in her first game back in the PWHL.
A cameo on “SNL,” however, was next-level.
“SNL was the ‘what is going on, what just happened,’ moment for me,” Keller said. “That is a show that you watch growing up and even now watching their skits, seeing them on social media, like (“SNL”) was definitely on my dream list. So it was pretty cool to be able to experience that with Hilary.”
It started with a call last week from Michaels, who spoke to Knight and Keller about coming on the show and went over the “SNL” team’s vision for the monologue. Knight, who revealed on CBS that she played through a torn MCL during the Olympics, is out indefinitely for the Seattle Torrent. But Keller, the captain of the PWHL’s Boston Fleet, played in Ottawa on Saturday night just hours before “SNL” was set to air.
“Of course the game goes to overtime and a shootout,” said Keller, who played nearly 30 minutes in her team’s 2-1 victory.
After the game, there was a private plane waiting for Keller at the Ottawa airport that took her right to New York City, then a car to the NBC Studios at 30 Rockefeller Plaza, where “SNL” is filmed in Studio 8H. When she arrived, Keller met “Heated Rivalry” star Connor Storrie, that night’s host, and went right into a dress rehearsal in front of a live audience. Even during rehearsals, the cheers for Keller and Knight were so loud — and lengthy — that Keller didn’t know when she was supposed to say her lines.
“The applause,” she said, “was not stopping.”
When it came time for the real thing, Keller was so nervous she said she was “shaking in my boots.” A few minutes into his monologue, Storrie brought out Quinn and Jack Hughes to joke about “Heated Rivalry,” then made room for Keller and Knight, who walked onto the stage to an even bigger cheer.
“It was so loud,” Keller said. “That’s something that I’ll remember forever.”
When the applause finally died down, Keller delivered the first punchline, aimed at Storrie: “Don’t worry, we saw your show.”
When Storrie said it was “so cool” all four players were there, Knight dropped a punchline of her own: “It was gonna be just us, but we thought we’d invite the guys, too.”
“Yeah, we thought we’d give them a little moment to shine,” added Keller.
Michaels and the “SNL” writers were the masterminds behind all the jokes, but Keller said the team made sure the players were comfortable with them.
“They deserve all the credit and I thought they did such a nice job,” Keller said. “It was so fun to be a part of.”
The players’ main joke was in reference to U.S. President Donald Trump telling the men’s team after they won gold that he’d “probably be impeached” if he didn’t invite the women’s team to the White House and State of the Union as well. The phone call, which was posted to social media, and the men’s reaction to Trump’s comment — several players laughed — dominated online discourse for a week and was met with plenty of backlash.
The women’s team, meanwhile, decided not to attend the State of the Union, citing in a statement to The Athletic “the timing and previously scheduled academic and professional commitments.”
In a news conference upon returning from Milan, Knight called Trump’s remark “distasteful” and expressed disappointment that she had to “explain someone else’s behavior.”
When asked about Trump’s comments, Keller emphasized that her focus has been on celebrating what the women’s team accomplished in Milan.
“Everybody’s entitled to their own opinion and things kind of snowball and then get crazy,” she said. “(I’m) just focusing on how special of a team that we had and I think we did a great job of getting back to that and I think the world has too.
“For us it’s the honor of a lifetime to put on the USA jersey and represent our country and all of our fans and our nation at the Olympics. We wanted to bring home gold and we got to do that and the men’s team did as well,” she added. “We have a lot of respect for them and grew to become friends with them and cheered them on as they did us.”
The U.S. women had won gold before — in 1998 and 2018 — but never in such dominant fashion. In Milan, the Americans dismantled opponents 33-2 and handed their Canadian rivals their worst loss ever at the Olympics. Their 2-1 win in the gold medal game was Team USA’s eighth straight against Canada and second consecutive victory in a championship game, dating back to last year’s Women’s World Championship.
The roster was packed with skill and star power, and paced offensively by Keller and 23-year-old star defender Caroline Harvey, who won tournament MVP. Knight scored the game-tying goal on a torn MCL in her final Olympic appearance. Goalie Aerin Frankel became the first woman to post three shutouts in a single Olympic tournament.
“It was one of the best American teams that we’ve put on the ice in international play and at the Olympics,” said Keller. “That’s what should be celebrated.”
At last week’s State of the Union address, Trump said the U.S. women’s team “will soon be coming to the White House.” The specifics of that invitation are unclear, including to Keller.
“I know in years past, every Olympics, no matter who’s in office, Team USA is always invited to the White House,” Keller said.
There’s also the matter of the ongoing PWHL season, which will look to capitalize on the attention women’s hockey received at the Olympics.
The women’s Olympic finale drew an average of 5.3 million viewers in the U.S., with 7.7 million viewers tuned in for overtime; audiences peaked in Canada with over 4 million viewers before Keller scored the game-winning goal. On Friday, Knight’s Seattle Torrent set a new U.S. arena record for attendance at a women’s hockey game with 17,355 fans at Climate Pledge Arena.
According to the PWHL, on Feb. 24 and 25 — after the league’s return from the Olympic break — the league saw its biggest home venue ticket sales days of the season since opening weekend. By Friday, merchandise sales also increased 101 percent. For a league in its third year, it will only help that Knight and Keller wore their PWHL jerseys during the goodnights on “SNL” on Saturday; they also gifted Storrie and his “Heated Rivalry” costar Hudson Williams PWHL jerseys of their own.
“We’ve never come back from the Olympics and and hopped right into a league — we (used to) come back and our fans don’t get to watch us play anymore, or they have to wait until the next worlds, the next Olympics,” Keller said. “To really galvanize all the support and the viewership that we gain from the Olympics and bring that back to the PWHL, us as players have definitely felt that.
“It’s just a great time for women’s hockey and hockey in general to bring more fans into our sport and our league.”
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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