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Meet every queer athlete on the Olympic women's hockey team

Team USA just got a little bit more gay!

Cayla Barnes, Hilary Knight, and Alex Carpenter.​

Cayla Barnes, Hilary Knight, and Alex Carpenter.

Leila Devlin/Getty Images; Harry How/Getty Images; Leila Devlin/Getty Images

The 2026 Winter Olympics are right around the corner, and it’s (hopefully) shaping up to be just as queer as the last summer games, where 193 LGBTQ+ athletes competed.

The roster for Team USA’s women’s hockey has been announced, and while there are only three queer players, they all come from the new PWHL team, the Seattle Torrent.


Star players and Alex Carpenter, Hilary Knight, and Cayla Barnes are all stepping onto the ice for the U.S., having already played as teammates in the 2025-26 PWHL season.

These sapphic athletes have not only taken home medals for Team USA at past Olympics but are so talented that they are likely to score big at the Italy games as well.

The XXV Winter Olympic Games will be held in Milano Cortina, Italy, from February 6-22, 2026.

Hilary Knight

Star forward Hilary Knight is headed to the Olympics for the fifth time as part of Team USA, becoming the first American hockey player to do so. Knight won gold in 2018 and silver in 2010, 2014, and 2022. She currently plays for the Seattle Torrent in the PWHL and is dating Olympic speed skater Brittany Bowe.

Alex Carpenter

Seattle Torrent star Alex Carpenter is representing Team USA for the third time after helping win silver medals at the Olympics in 2014 and 2022, where she was the only out American hockey player. Carpenter married Steph Klein, an assistant equipment manager with the Toronto Marlies, in Hawaii in 2023.

Cayla Barnes

Cayla Barnes, another player on the Seattle Torrent, has been to the Olympics twice before, winning old in 2018, where she was the youngest player on Team USA, and silver in 2022. Barnes and her girlfriend Hope Walinski, a goalie for the Providence College Women’s Hockey team in Rhode Island, have been dating for a little over three years.

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