Milano Cortina Olympics: Five storylines to follow

John Niyo of The Detroit News highlights five storylines to follow at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy:

Stars on ice

The rink may be smaller, but the spotlight is bigger and brighter, as the NHL will pause its season to participate in the Olympics for the first time since 2014. And while concerns over construction delays in Milan overshadowed the run-up to this tournament – the ice sheet is a few feet short of NHL standards, and the arena capacity is a few thousand seats less than what was promised – the return of the world’s best players is a boon to the International Olympic Committee and its broadcast partners.

Canada, which won gold in 2014 in Sochi, arrives as the favorite, thanks to a roster that includes NHL scoring leaders Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon, and stars ranging from 38-year-old Sidney Crosby to 19-year-old Macklin Celebrini. But the U.S. team, which includes a half-dozen Michigan natives, is loaded, too. And after losing an overtime thriller to the Canadians at last year’s 4 Nations Face-Off, Team USA is out to win Olympic gold for the first time since the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” in Lake Placid, N.Y.

Game on.

Tale of two cities

Milan and Cortina d'Ampezzo are the first dual-city hosts of the Games. And given that the two are nearly 250 miles apart, this will be the most geographically spread-out Winter Olympics ever. Viewers will get a taste of that immediately Friday, when the Opening Ceremony ends with twin Olympic cauldrons lit in both cities. The competition featuring 116 events and nearly 3,000 athletes then will play out over an 8,500 square-mile map across three regions: Lombardia, Trentino and Veneto.

Cortina, a winter resort in the Dolomite mountains, hosted the 1956 Winter Olympics on its own. And it’ll be home to the women’s alpine skiing, as well as curling and the sliding events – bobsled, luge and skeleton. Bormio and Livigno in the Italian Alps will host the men’s alpine events, along with snowboarding and freestyle skiing. Milan is where you’ll find hockey, figure skating and speed skating. And the host nation will bid farewell with the Closing Ceremony at an ancient arena in the city of Verona.

War and peace

Geopolitical tensions are intertwined with the Games much like the Olympic rings, and these Winter Olympics will be no different. Athletes and Russia and Belarus remain banned from competing their national flag at the Olympics due to the war in Ukraine. And though 20 Olympians from those two countries will compete as Individual Neutral Athletes, there will be no Russian hockey team and only a few figure skaters from a country that traditionally dominates that sport. There’s also the escalating conflict between the U.S. and Canada, as well as the European Union, fueled by the nationalist rhetoric from the Trump administration, international trade disputes and talk of annexing Greenland.

We saw that play out last winter as fans in the U.S. and Canada booed the other’s respective national anthems at hockey games. Additionally, the fact that ICE agents are assisting with U.S. security at the Olympics has sparked protests in Milan, including from the city’s mayor. The backlash also prompted U.S. Olympic officials to rename their hospitality space from “The Ice House” to “The Winter House.”

That's entertainment

Last year, NBC reached a $3 billion deal with the IOC to continue broadcasting the Olympics through 2036. Those exclusive rights, which include its streaming service, Peacock, are just part of what Jenny Storms, NBC Universal’s chief marketing officer, recently described as a “year-round pop culture franchise, not just a 17-day sporting event.” And as the centerpiece of what is being promoted as “Legendary February,” with NBC also televising the Super Bowl and NBA All-Star Game this month, the Milano Cortina Olympics will feature a lot more than skiing, skating and sledding.

Hosts Mike Tirico and Maria Taylor will kick off the opening weekend anchoring coverage from both the Super Bowl in California and the Olympics in Milan. They’ll close the three-week run Feb. 22 in similar fashion, incorporating a Celtics-Lakers NBA game in Los Angeles, the site of the 2028 Summer Olympics. In between, expect to see plenty of celebrities on your TV, from Snoop Dogg and Stanley Tucci – both will have recurring roles in Italy – to a slew of social-media influencers.

Evening the score

The 2024 Paris Olympics were hailed as a milestone as the first Games to achieve gender parity, at least in terms of the distribution quota for competition among male and female athletes. And while the actual participation numbers weren’t quite 50-50, organizers again are touting the Milano Cortina Games for setting a new benchmark for the Winter Olympics. Women will make up a record 47% of the athletes, up from 45% at the 2022 Beijing Olympics. And full gender parity has been achieved in 12 of the 16 winter sports in terms of competition programs.

The 232-athlete roster for Team USA includes 115 women and 117 men, and that will be represented during Friday’s Opening Ceremony when speed skater Erin Jackson, who four years ago became the first Black woman to win an individual gold medal at the Winter Olympics, joins bobsledder Frank Del Duca as flag bearers for the Americans.

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