Experienced Team USA Roster is Ready for the Grind at the U18 Women’s World Championship

The 2026 U.S. Under-18 Women’s National Team has its sights set on gold this year when the IIHF Under-18 Women’s World Championship gets underway on Jan. 10.
The U.S. has 10 players in Sydney and Membertou, Nova Scotia, looking to build upon last year’s silver medal, including talented goaltender Morgan Stickney.

Stickney played every minute of the 2025 tournament and earned media All-Star Team honors. She also became the first U18 goalie to ever record three shutouts through the preliminary round, and her shutout streak of 183:01 minutes also set a tournament record. In a field featuring many netminders making their tournament debut, Stickney’s experience stands out as an advantage for Team USA. 

Maggie Averill, who was named team captain prior to the tournament, will be playing in her third U18 World Championship. The defender is a solid and imposing blue line presence who uses her long reach to her advantage, particularly in angling play away from the middle of the ice. She isn’t easily knocked off the puck and possesses a strong shot.

Averill brings not just a calm and quiet demeanor to the locker room, but a real commitment to details on and off the ice. Courtney Kennedy, head coach of the U.S. Under-18 Women’s National Team, said she sometimes forgets how young Averill is and will find herself talking to Averill about play breakdowns. She’s mature and steady and incredibly selfless in always putting the team first, said Kennedy. 

The biggest impact Averill has is off the ice, where she sets a prime example for others, said Kennedy. She’s always early, always prepared and taking notes and makes a point to ensure everyone on the team feels heard and included and is fitting in. 

“She's a really good person to kind of mimic off ice, which can set a lot of players for success,” Kennedy said. “They're all coming in with a lot of hockey talent. What you need to learn is composure, confidence and good habits.”

Averill said she’s doing her best to enjoy the moment while knowing that this is a big accomplishment. A younger sister to Caroline, who was on the team with Maggie the past two tournaments, this is a good chance for Maggie to establish herself individually. 

Back in August, the U.S. beat Canada twice in a three-game series, so the Americans enter this tournament with the knowledge that they can win at the highest level.

Averill said while the Americans have that confidence boost, they are not getting ahead of themselves. 

“There is no perfect tournament,” she said. “There are going to be ups and downs. We have to try to keep our cool. You're going to make a mistake, but how you react and move forward is what matters most.”

While the team features several players from hockey hotbeds like Minnesota and Massachusetts, there’s also players from Texas, Wyoming, Kentucky, Pennsylvania and California. They each bring a different style of play and different paths to the national team.

Kennedy said she loves how each player’s background shapes them and ultimately impacts teammates. The makeup of this roster shows the growth of girls’ hockey in the U.S. and shows players across the country what is possible for them.

“This is Team USA. Why not be from everywhere?” Kennedy said. “It also allows little girls everywhere to dream of it and maybe say, ‘That player is from my state or the state next to me. I can play hockey, too.’”

The U.S. roster is full of talented players. Therefore, Kennedy does not want to label her lines in terms of first or second or third. Instead, she looks at them as interchangeable in terms of what the team needs to accomplish in a shift or in a game or against a certain opponent. The players each bring different skills and that means they can be strategically deployed as the situation demands. 

“What we've seen so far in the chemistry of these lines has been a lot of fun,” Kennedy said. “They work hard for that chemistry to work. We’re seeing them learn to play together and meld as we go day-by-day and we’ll see what they become as the tournament evolves. All the players show up every day and are giving it 100 percent and they really give it all for each other. That gives us the ability to change things up as needed,”

Kennedy knows winning gold won’t be easy. The tournament spans just nine calendar days. If they make it to the gold-medal game, the Americans will play hockey on six of those days.

Despite the short timeline, there’s incredible room for growth game-to-game and even shift-to-shift. Kennedy and her staff will be counting on their team to put in the work, show improvement and be selfless. 

“Every team we're playing in this tournament is strong. Sometimes people don't realize how hard it is to win a tournament like this,” she said. “But we can’t be afraid of it being hard. We want to win. But they have to play every piece of it. They have to be relentless and hard-working, and it has to be bigger than themselves.”

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.

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