Seven hockey players to carry flags at 2026 Olympic opening ceremony
Seven hockey players will carry their respective country’s flag at the opening ceremony of the Milan Cortina 2026 Olympics on Friday, headlined by three current NHL players, including the Edmonton Oilers’ Leon Draisaitl, Boston Bruins’ David Pastrnak, and Winnipeg Jets’ Nino Niederreiter.
Most nations have opted to use two flag bearers, one man and one woman, for the opening ceremony, as has become tradition in the IOC’s efforts towards gender equality. However, some nations will see their two flag bearers split up.
Unlike traditional opening ceremony programmes, Milan Cortina 2026 will see several locations for the Parade of Athletes. Most hockey players will participate at the marquee central venue, the San Siro in Milan, while other athletes will be dispersed across Northern Italy at Olympic venues in Livigno, Predazzo, and Cortina.
Canada’s flag bearers, Olympic champion freestyle skiers Mikaël Kingsbury and Marielle Thompson, will both be in Livigno and not present in Milan. Many NHLers will also miss the ceremony festivities due to NHL scheduling constraints.
Draisaitl won an international public vote to carry Germany’s flag into the stadium, and he will carry it alone, as his partner, two-time Olympic silver medalist in women’s ski jumping, Katherina Schmidt, will be based in Val di Fiemme near the ski jumps.
Leon Draisaitl wird Fahnenträger von #TeamD 🔥 Unser NHL-Star wird bei der Eröffnungsfeier in Mailand die deutsche Fahne tragen! 🇩🇪😍 Das bestätigte der DOSB am heutigen Abend! 🤩 Herzlichen Glückwunsch, Leon! 👏 #debteams #eishockey #olympics #fahnenträger
Pastrnak will also carry his country’s colors alone into the stadium, joined by biathlete Lucie Charvátová, who will be based in the Cortina cluster and will compete at her second Olympic Games.
Niederreiter, who returns to the Olympics after playing in the last Games with NHL players at Sochi 2014, will carry the Swiss flag into the stadium in Milan, while his partner and six-time Olympic ski cross athlete, Fanny Smith, does so in Livigno.
Former NHL defenseman Mikko Lehtonen is also one of the few men’s hockey players heading to his second Olympics, returning to the Games after playing at PyeongChang 2018. Now playing in Switzerland, he will carry the Finnish flag solo, while his partner, five-time Olympic cross-country skiing medalist Krista Pärmäkoski, will be in Val di Fiemme.
Also returning to his second Olympics, Jesper Jensen will carry the Danish flag after representing his country at Beijing 2022. A longtime blueliner on Denmark’s national team, Jensen has never played in North America and will be joined by curler Denise Dupont, who will be in Cortina.
Carrying the Latvia flag will be former Ottawa Senators left winger Kaspars Daugaviņš, who returns to the Olympics for the second time at 37. He’ll be joined by alpine ski racer, Dženifera Ģērmane, who will carry her flag in Cortina.
Rounding out the hockey players with flag bearer honors is former NHL star Tomáš Tatar, who now plays in Switzerland after an NHL career that spanned the Montreal Canadiens, Detroit Red Wings, Vegas Golden Knights, Colorado Avalanche, Seattle Kraken and New Jersey Devils. He’ll be at his second Olympics with Slovakia, after playing in 2014, and will be joined by bobsledder Viktória Čerňanská, who will carry her flag in Cortina.
The Milan Cortina 2026 opening ceremony is set for Friday at 2:00 p.m. ET on CBC Gem and TV in Canada, and on NBC in the United States, with the men’s Olympic hockey tournament beginning Feb. 11.
Milan Cortina Hockey Players as Flag Bearers
- David Pastrnak – Czechia
- Jesper Jensen – Denmark
- Mikko Lehtonen – Finland
- Leon Draisaitl – Germany
- Kaspars Daugaviņš – Latvia
- Tomáš Tatar – Slovakia
- Nino Niederreiter – Switzerland