Kenny Albert, the lead NHL play-by-play broadcaster for Turner Sports and previously a longtime voice for NBC’s coverage of hockey, will call Team USA men’s and women’s games at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan, the network is set to announce Thursday.
Joining Albert in the booth for men’s games is a familiar partner — Eddie Olczyk, who works for both NBC Sports and Turner Sports. Brian Boucher returns for his third consecutive Winter Games for the “Inside the Glass” reporter position. He is also part of Turner Sports’ coverage of the NHL.
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For U.S. women’s games, Albert will pair with two-time Olympic medalist A.J. Mleczko. Jennifer Botterill, a three-time Olympic gold medalist with Team Canada, will make her NBC Olympics debut as the “Inside the Glass” analyst, starting with the quarterfinals.
This will be Albert’s seventh Winter Olympics as a hockey play-by-play voice, a record for an American hockey broadcaster. He will also handle play-by-play for the medal rounds for both tournaments.
With geopolitics likely to be part of the context of the February tournament, NBC Sports is sitting on a potential viewership goldmine. Last February at the 4 Nations Face-Off men’s exhibition event, Canada’s 3-2 overtime win over the United States in Boston drew an astonishing 9.3 million viewers on ESPN. It topped Game 7 of the NHL Finals between the Boston Bruins and St. Louis Blues in 2019, which drew 8.9 million viewers on NBC, the most-watched NHL game since the league moved back to broadcast TV in 1995.
In Canada, Sportsnet said the 4 Nations Face-Off final averaged 5.7 million viewers and peaked at 7.3 million viewers when Connor McDavid scored the OT winner. Add in 1.18 million viewers on French-language TVA, and the game averaged nearly seven million viewers in Canada. (The country’s population is around 41 million.)
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Talk from U.S. President Donald Trump about Canada becoming the 51st state, a topic that produces real anger among Canadians, helped fuel the record numbers. Anthems were booed, tensions were high and the play on the ice made it clear how much it meant to the players.
The Olympic men’s competition will include the teams at the 4 Nations Face-Off (U.S., Canada, Finland and Sweden), as well as Czechia, Germany, Latvia and Slovakia, which will all boast lineups featuring NHL players. These Games will mark the first time since 2014 that NHL players have participated.
The U.S.-Canada matchup in women’s hockey is near the top of rivalries in sports today. The countries have faced each other in the gold medal game in six of the seven Olympic tournaments all time, with Canada winning 3-2 in the last Olympic final.
Kathryn Tappen, the NHL Network host and Turner Sports reporter, will be the on-site reporter for Team USA men’s and women’s games, medal-round competition, and additional matchups.
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Brendan Burke and Chris Vosters will handle additional play-by-play in the men’s and women’s hockey tournament. Former NHLers Anson Carter, a studio analyst for the NHL on NBC from 2013-21, and T.J. Oshie, a 2018 Stanley Cup champion with the Washington Capitals and current ESPN NHL analyst, will be the analysts. Angela Ruggiero, a four-time Olympic medal winner with Team USA, will be an analyst as well.
Prior to Paris, Olympic viewership had tumbled significantly in recent cycles, including a disastrous 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics, which averaged 11.4 million across all NBC Universal platforms, the least-watched Olympics in the modern era. But Paris changed that. The 2024 Summer Olympics averaged a whopping 30.7 million viewers per day, the most-watched Olympics since London in 2012.
The streaming service Peacock will be NBC’s primary platform for the 2026 Winter Games, which will run Feb. 6-22. Broadly, NBC’s Olympic plans include top events airing live during the day on NBC, and the entire Olympics streaming live on Peacock. (Milan is six hours ahead of Eastern time in the U.S.)
The women’s tournament begins Feb. 5, concluding on Feb. 19. The U.S. women have group-stage games on Feb. 5, 7 and 9. The men’s tournament runs Feb. 11-22, with the Americans’ group-stage games scheduled for Feb. 12, 14 and 15.
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
NHL, Sports Business, Olympics, Women’s Hockey
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