Penguins’ Mike Sullivan Named 2026 Team USA Olympic Coach, Four Nations Face-Off

Pittsburgh Penguins head coach Mike Sullivan earned as big of an honor as can be given to a coach short of the Hall of Fame Saturday when he was tabbed to coach Team USA in both the coming 2025 Four Nations Face-Off and the 2026 Winter Olympics.

The Four Nations Face-Off is an international tournament with NHL players from the U.S., Canada, Finland, and Sweden that will be played from Feb. 12-20, 2025. The NHL has not yet determined the host cities. The 2026 Winter Olympics will be held from Feb.6-22, 2026, in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo, Italy.

Sullivan, 55, was to coach the 2022 Team USA squad at the Olympics, but the NHL could not come to an agreement with the IIHF on player participation. He was an assistant coach of the 2006 Team USA team in Torino that finished a disappointing eighth under head coach Peter Laviolette.

Sullivan will also be the third current or former Penguins coach to lead Team USA in the Olympics. Herb Brooks won gold in 1980 as the Miracle on Ice but also led the 2002 team to a silver medal. In 2014, Dan Bylsma coached the USA to a fourth-place finish, losing a heartbreaker in the semi-finals to Canada, 1-0, before also losing the bronze medal game to Finland.

The Penguins coach is just one of three American coaches to notch 400 career wins, joining John Tortorella and Laviolette. Sullivan’s record as an NHL coach is 445-275-115, and he won back-to-back Stanley Cup championships in 2016-17.