Meet the Southeast Minnesotan Competing in the 2026 Winter Olympics

Just last week, I wrote about all of the Minnesotans who are going to represent Team USA at the Winter Olympics. If you looked carefully, you may have noticed that there's someone from Southeast Minnesota who's going to the Olympics!

READ MORE: Meet the 25 Athletes Minnesota is Sending to the Winter Olympics

Winter Olympics 2026

The Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony is on Friday, February 6th, officially kicking off the games. One of the big sports of the winter games, especially for Minnesotans, is ice hockey.

Southeast Minnesotan Competing in the 2026 Winter Olympics

Since Minnesota is the State of Hockey, it's no surprise that we're sending a ton of hockey players over to Italy to compete. And one of those hockey players is from Lake City!

Her name is Taylor Heise, and this will be her first time competing at the Olympics.

Taylor is 25, and she's already well-known in the hockey world. She played hockey at the University of Minnesota, won the 2022 Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award, which is an award that is given out to the top women's hockey player; she was the first overall draft pick for the 2023 PWHL Draft, and now plays for the Minnesota Frost.

And if that wasn't enough to impress you, she's also a two-time Walter Cup winner, named the 2024 PWHL Playoffs MVP, and has played on Team USA in the IIHF World Championship in 2022, 2023, 2024, and 2025, winning 2 golds and 2 silvers.

Keep an eye out for Taylor during the Olympics.

Here's Team USA's Women's Hockey schedule so far:

Thursday, February 5th - vs. Czechia (The Czech Republic) - 9:40 AM Central

Saturday, February 7th - vs. Finland - 9:40 AM Central

Monday, February 9th - vs. Switzerland - 1:40 PM Central

Tuesday, February 10th - vs. Canada - 1:40 Central