The obvious take about the Boston Bruins and the 2026 Winter Olympics in Milan Cortina is that it’s a great reflection on their roster talent that they sent nine total players from the organization to the Olympic hockey tournament taking place in Italy.
Charlie McAvoy and Jeremy Swayman were all decked out in their Team USA gear for Friday’s opening ceremonies, and David Pastrnak was honored as one of the flag bearers for Team Czechia during those same opening ceremonies.
It was an honor that the 29-year-old was incredibly humbled and honored by, and it speaks to how big of a deal No. 88 is in a home country where he’s going to be mentioned in the same breath as legends like Jaromir Jagr when it’s all said and done.
“Honestly [I am] speechless,” said Pastrnak after Wednesday night’s final regular-season shootout loss to the Panthers ahead of the Olympic break. “Very, very honored and going over there to represent my country. I am going to give them my all. Very happy and honored to be able to hold our flag and represent us at the ceremony.”
But there is another side to all of this, and it’s the incredible strain that having so many Olympic players is going to have on the Black and Gold once the NHL resumes, and the B’s play their final 25 regular-season games in the six-week sprint to the Stanley Cup playoffs.
The Bruins will have eight players at the Olympic games after it was announced on Saturday that Pavel Zacha will be withdrawing from services for Team Czechia due to an injury, he suffered last week while playing with the Bruins.
🇨🇿 GM Jiri Slegr on centre Pavel Zacha being unavailable for Olympics due to injury:
“It’s sad for our team &, of course, for Pavel because he was very anxious to be here … unfortunately, he’s hurt. They wouldn’t let him come here so it’s sad”
Open 🆚 🇨🇦 Thursday@TSN_Sports pic.twitter.com/YZeVWEvFcX
— Mark Masters (@markhmasters) February 7, 2026
That leaves McAvoy and Swayman playing for Team USA, Pastrnak leading Team Czechia, Elias Lindholm and Hampus Lindholm playing for Team Sweden, Dans Locmelis playing for Team Latvia and Henri Jokiharju and Joonas Korpisalo playing for Team Finland. That is one of the highest participation numbers for an NHL team in the Olympics, along with the Florida Panthers sending nearly half their roster to Italy as well.
Everybody saw during last season’s 4 Nations Faceoff what can happen when a
