EIGHT FORMER AMERKS COMPETING IN 2026 OLYMPICS
Amerks’ past well represented in this year’s Winter Games
Feb 12, 2026By Andrew Mossbrooks | @ Mossbrooks48
Amid both the NHL and AHL schedules being put on pause, the Rochester Americans can still watch on as some of their own from yesteryear go on to compete in the grandest stage of sports.
This year’s Winter Olympic Games from Milan, Italy feature the return of NHL players to being able to compete for the first time since 2014. As a result, a staggering eight former Amerks and two current members of the Buffalo Sabres have swapped their NHL jerseys for that of their fellow countrymen to compete in Italy throughout the month.
Tage Thompson is the most notable and likely the favorite of the eight as he represents Team USA. Thompson’s time with Rochester was short, appearing in 24 games over two seasons in the Flower City during the 2018-19 and 2019-20 campaigns, respectively. In that time period, the Phoenix, Arizona, native collected 12 goals and 21 points. Thompson would go on to make the Sabres’ 2020-21 roster during the COVID-impacted season and never look back.
Since then, Thompson has gone on to score 196 goals, including a career-best 47 in 2022-23, finishing sixth in the league. The 28-year-old has led Buffalo in scoring four straight seasons and is currently leading the charge with 30 goals on the year. This marks Thompson’s Olympic debut and sixth international appearance overall in which he he represents the United State in tournament play, having done so twice on the World Juniors’ stage and three more at the IIHF World Championships, including last season where he served as an alternate captain and scored the gold medal-winning goal.
Though he will not play due to injury, Sabres goaltender Ukko-Pekka Luukkonen is one of three former Amerks that was named to Team Finland. Luukkonen has appeared in parts of six different seasons for Rochester dating back to his AHL debut during the 2018-19 campaign. This includes an appearance earlier this season when the Sabres reassigned the seventh-year pro for a one-game conditioning stint. The Espoo, Finland, netminder shows a 33-26-15 lifetime record as an Amerk and has taken the crease for 176 NHL games, including 55 last season alone.
Team Finland has a couple of veteran skaters who began their careers in North America with Rochester as forward Joel Armia along with defenseman Rasmus Ristolainen will be competing for their country over the few weeks. The two have been teammates in Rochester, Buffalo, and will now be reunited for the first time since the two skated in one game together with the Sabres during the 2014-15 season.
Over a decade ago, Armia and Ristolainen began their playing careers as Amerks in 2013-14. That season, Armia posted 27 points (7+20), while Ristolainen hit 20 (6+14) in just 34 games. Those would be the only AHL games to date for Ristolainen, who has since been a steady presence on the blue lines of Buffalo and Philadelphia, appearing in 795 NHL games.
Armia would go on to play part of the next season with Rochester before getting traded to the Winnipeg Jets’ organization. From there, the former first-round draft pick played three seasons with the Jets, then seven with Montreal, appearing in the Stanley Cup Final with the Canadiens in 2021. Armia is currently in his first season with Los Angeles and has played 637 NHL games.
While Luukkonen is unable to play, Swedish goaltender Jacob Markström will get to wear his country’s colors as he makes his first appearance in the Olympics. The veteran goaltender is in his second season in the crease for New Jersey and has worn the sweater of four different NHL clubs (Florida, Vancouver, Calgary), but first put an Amerks jersey over his head in 2010.
As a rookie, Markström played in 37 games for the Amerks during the 2010-11 season, working out a 16-20-1 record. His first professional shutout came as an Amerk on Dec. 17, 2010, when he made 27 saves against Toronto. Over a decade later, he would lead the NHL with nine shutouts during the 2021-22 season in Calgary, while being a finalist for the Vezina Trophy as the league’s best goaltender.
Two-time Stanley Cup Champion Sam Reinhart was named to Team Canada. The Vancouver native had a cup of coffee with the Amerks, playing in three games for Rochester near the end of the 2014-15 campaign after his major junior season ended. Reinhart would post three assists in as many games wearing the red, white, and blue. He has since gone on to appear in 832 NHL games, amassing an impressive 321 goals and 674 points. In the 2023-24 season, Reinhart registered a career high-57 goals as a forward for the Florida Panthers, trailing only Pavel Bure for the franchise’s all-time single-season record.
One of the more recent Amerks graduates to be named to an Olympics roster is forward JJ Peterka, who joins Team Germany. Peterka burst onto the scene as a rookie in Rochester with a 68-point campaign (28+40) in 70 games during the team’s 2021-22 season. He led all rookies in goals and points and was named to the AHL’s All-Rookie Team while helping Rochester reach the Calder Cup Playoffs. Peterka would spend the next three seasons in Buffalo, scoring 56 goals over the past two seasons before being traded to Utah over the summer.
Longtime Sabre Zemgus Girgensons spent a solo season in the Flower City, appearing in 61 games with the 2012-13 Amerks before playing a decade in blue and gold. His first professional goal came at Blue Cross Arena Nov. 2, 2012, against Hamilton. After potting six in the regular season, Girgensons scored three goals in as many Calder Cup Playoff games, including two in game one against Toronto. Known more for his defensive game, the two-goal performance is Girgensons’ only career multi-goal game in playoff action and was the first of eight multi-goal performances the Latvian-born forward has had in his 887-game career.
Girgensons is the only former Amerk this year to be competing in his second Olympics, having last played in Sochi in 2014.