B/R NHL Staff Predictions for the Winner of the 2026 Men's Olympic Hockey Tournament

Hockey fans, the wait is finally over.

For the first time since 2014, the NHL will send its players to the Winter Olympics to compete in a best-on-best hockey tournament. And judging from last year's 4 Nations Face-Off, the intensity is going to be ramped up.

Will Canada continue to dominate prestigious tournaments? Will the United States finally get out of the shadow of its neighbor to the north? Or will a European side spoil the party and win gold?

Our B/R NHL Staff provided their gold-medal predictions ahead of the big tournament.

Sidney Crosby Leads Canada to Olympic Gold Again

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Sidney Crosby and Canada won the 4 Nations Face-Off Championship last year.

Pittsburgh Penguins captain Sidney Crosby is already a member of the vaunted "Triple Gold Club," with two Olympic gold medals (2010, 2014), World Championship gold (2015), and three Stanley Cups (2009, 2016, 2017).

This year, however, will likely be the 38-year-old's last Winter Olympics.

The road to gold this time for Crosby and Canada could be the toughest yet. While Russia is banned from this tournament, the Canadians will face stiff competition from the United States, Sweden, Finland, and Czechia. Switzerland and Germany are capable of pulling off upsets and shouldn't be taken lightly.

Canada's goaltending could be its Achilles heel. Jordan Binnington has struggled this season, Darcy Kuemper recently returned from an injury, and Logan Thompson lacks championship experience. However, if one of them can step up, Canada should be fine.

The defense corps is in good shape, led by superstar Cale Makar with reliable all-around defensemen such as Devon Toews, Colton Parayko, and Drew Doughty. This will be Doughty's final Olympics, giving him and Crosby the chance to become the first Canadians to win three gold medals in Men's Olympic hockey.

It's Canada's deep forward lines that should make the difference, as they did a year ago in the 4 Nations Face-Off.

Crosby will be joined by superstars Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon, bringing their impressive scoring punch to this tournament. They'll have solid two-way forwards in Mitch Marner, Nick Suzuki, Sam Bennett, Brad Marchand, and Mark Stone, as well as the grit of Tom Wilson and Brandon Hagel.

The wild card could be forward Macklin Celebrini. The 19-year-old San Jose Sharks sophomore has blossomed into a superstar in his own right. His superb offensive skills, sound defensive play, and hockey smarts could provide an additional lift, putting Canada atop the winner's podium.

- Lyle Richardson

Sweden's Defense Carries It to Gold

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So much focus is on the Canadian and United States teams, and one of them will end up in the gold medal game, but Sweden will actually take home gold on the strength of its defense, which might be the best defensive unit in the entire field.

While Sweden's forward group may not have as many superstar-level players as the Canadians or Americans, there is more than enough talent up front to score at a championship level.

The other thing I like about Sweden's roster: I do not see an obvious weakness here.

The bottom half of the Canadian defense has a significant drop-off compared to the top half, and goaltending will be a major question if they insist on sticking with Jordan Binnington.

The American team, while very good, is still in a "prove it to me" situation: I need to see them score enough goals in a big game and actually win one of these big games in a best-on-best tournament before I believe it. I also do not trust them to make the right lineup decisions. Again .... prove me wrong.

Sweden, meanwhile, is just rock-solid from top to bottom. Best defense in the field. Strong two-way forwards that can still score enough, and depth. Very good goaltending.

The Canadians and Americans have all of the hype going on. The Swedes will end up with the results.

- Adam Gretz

Canada Too Stacked For USA Growth To Matter

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Sidney Crosby

Is this the best Olympic roster Team USA has ever put together? Yes. Does Team USA's defensive depth look better than Team Canada's? No doubt.

How much does all of this matter when Team Canada has Connor McDavid on the first line, Nathan MacKinnon on the second line, and Sidney Crosby on the third line? We'll see, but it's hard to look at that center depth and convince myself that Team USA will come out on top.

Team Canada has the luxury of experienced Olympic veterans (especially captain Crosby), a hungry-to-win best player in the world making his Olympic debut in McDavid, and the all-around beast that is MacKinnon.

Historically, Team USA has struggled to score in medal rounds. It feels like too much bad juju that the brass left off the two players leading all American-born NHLers in goals this season: Jason Robertson and Cole Caufield.

Too much has to go right for the USA to win, and some of it might: Team Canada's worst-case scenario is awful if Binnington's bad games this season are any indication, plus the defensive depth can be exploited. But leaving Robertson and Caufield off gives the USA fewer opportunities to exploit Canada's weaker defense in the first place.

Team Canada has the three most transcendent centers in the game, and that feels like the difference.

- Sara Civian

The United States Finally Wins Gold

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Brady Tkachuk, Matthew Tkachuk, Quinn Hughes and Jack Hughes

Admittedly, there's good reason for American hockey fans to be down on this edition of Team USA.

Deserving players such as Jason Robertson, Cole Caufield, Adam Fox, and Lane Hutson are watching at home. No offense to the likes of J.T. Miller and Vincent Trocheck, but their resumes this season do not deserve a place on an elite team like this.

But, let's not kid ourselves. This is a damn good team.

Quinn Hughes, who wasn't on last year's 4 Nations squad, is healthy and playing at the top of his game. Zach Werenski is playing at a Norris-winning level. And the USA's goaltending is by far the best in the tournament.

The key here is health. Will Jack Hughes be effective enough? Is Matthew Tkachuk anywhere near 100 percent? If those two are anywhere near their peak, the US will be extremely tough to beat.

And in any potential rematch from the 4 Nations Final, Quinn Hughes will be there on the blue line. His addition to the roster is that much of a boost that the Americans finally get it done.

- Lucky Ngamwajasat

No Miracle, But US Gets it Done

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Valid points made by all.

Canada is loaded, and there's no logical reason, given the talent up and down the roster, to look at them and suggest they won't win. And maybe easily.

But we'll call this one a hunch. Because, as my man Lucky pointed out one slide earlier, the U.S. team is pretty darn loaded, too.

They've got a pair of Cup winners among the forward ranks, the best two defensemen in the NHL (based on the last month or so) on the blue line, and another multiple-Cup winner behind the bench.

Where I see the most decisive difference, though, is in goal.

Again, as Lucky noted earlier, the trio of Connor Hellebuyck, Jake Oettinger, and Jeremy Swayman is as good as, or better than, any in the tournament.

In fact, Hellebuyck and Oettinger are 1-2 in the NHL in wins since the last time the Winter Olympics were held in 2022, and Swayman is only 12th on that list because he shared net time with Linus Ullmark before the latter was sent to Ottawa in 2024.

The medal-round games are sure to be close, and if you ask me, I'd rather lean on any of those three guys in a big spot ahead of a hot-and-cold guy like Binnington, an oft-injured guy like Kuemper, or a not-yet-proven-in-the-big-moment guy like Thompson.

Cue up Al Michaels, and we'll see you on the medals stand.

- Lyle Fitzsimmons

It's Hard To Be Humble When You're As Good As Canada

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Sidney Crosby and Drew Doughty

The fun part of predictions is that you can pick anything you want, make a case for it, and stick by that until it's proven true or not, and it's all in good fun.

The problem with predicting the gold-medal winner at the Olympics when Canada is sending its best is how do you pick against them? It feels pointless to try to build a case against them.

With Nathan MacKinnon, Connor McDavid, Sidney Crosby, Cale Makar, and every other megastar in the league all united to try to crush the world at hockey, it's so hard to believe they can't just roll to gold the way they did in 2014, 2010 and 2002 with all of this NHL talent.

Sure, goaltending is a concern if you want it to be, but with the way those past super teams put their egos aside and worked together to roll to victory, even with the USA giving them fits in 2002 and 2010 as well as again last year at the 4 Nations Face-Off, it's just too much talent.

- Joe Yerdon