Ice Wolves to help US women’s hockey team prepare for Beijing Olympics

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. – For the first time, New Mexico will play a role in helping the U.S. women’s hockey team try to defend their gold medal.

The winter games are not until February – but starting next week people can see the nation’s best women hockey players in Albuquerque.

The USA women’s national hockey team will be playing at The Outpost in Albuquerque. They are going to be playing the Ice Wolves, and KOB 4 spoke to the team about these unique couple of games.

The Ice Wolves are having a pretty good season.

"They’re pretty excited, you know, I mean it’s something that none of them have ever done,” said Phil Fox, Ice Wolves coach.

Fox recently told his team they will be playing the best women hockey players in the nation.

"To be able to help them get ready for the Olympics is an amazing experience that we’ll never have again in our lifetime,” said Dillan Bentley, Ice Wolves center.

The USA women’s team will play the Ice Wolves in a pair of exhibition games on Monday and Tuesday to get help get them ready to defend their gold medal in China. The team will have to change their game – for example, no body checking is allowed – which might be hard.

"I think it will be difficult on the forecheck, probably," said Bentley.

This game came to be as a plan B.

"They were supposed to be in Ireland playing the Russian national team and COVID issues in Russia canceled those games and they wanted high altitude training and some good competition,” said Stan Hubbard, Ice Wolves owner.

Hubbard said this is a first.

"I am pretty certain that no U.S. Hockey Team has ever come to New Mexico for any reason," he said.

Tickets might be hard to come by for these couple of games, click here for information on how to watch New Mexico Ice Wolves on HockeyTV.