Some of the best young hockey players in the country will soon gather in Lake Placid for the annual USA Hockey Women’s National Festival.

It’s an event that helps support the strength of women’s hockey, with players either in college or high school competing for roster spots, with goals of eventually representing the United States of America.

Of course, the women’s Olympic team won gold earlier this year in Italy, and the woman who helped shape the roster and will play a big role in the festival is from Central New York.

What You Need To Know

Katie Million, born in Hannibal and a state employee for nearly 20 years, helped shape the 2026 U.S. women’s hockey team that won gold in the Olympics

Million says making the calls on who made the team and who didn’t was very tough and also rewarding

Million returned home after the Olympics and a number of players from the 1980 Miracle on Ice team were at the airport to greet her

“To be back here now celebrating that gold medal, you know, and where my Olympic roots really started is, is incredibly special,” Katie Million said.

Born in Oswego County, the village of Hannibal, Million knows New York state and Lake Placid. In fact, she worked for the Olympic Regional Development Authority there for some 17 years.

“I’m so thankful that I have a circle of people that, you know, I can share that with,” she said.

That, the gold medal, is from in February. The Olympics in Italy saw the U.S. women’s hockey team knock off Canada in overtime to win it all. Million is the team’s general manager.

“I’m up in a suite overlooking that [overtime game-winning] goal, and we’re just jumping up and down like children. It was unbelievable,” she said.

From Hannibal, to shaping that gold medal roster, Million’s journey is as interesting as they come. While working with ORDA in Lake Placid a decade ago, she helped start the Miracle on Ice Fantasy Camp, where people could come spend a week with the 1980 U.S. men’s gold medal-winning hockey team. That team was so impressed with what she did for them, they asked her to manage them appearances, autograph signings and more.

“I think my jaw dropped and I was like, here wasn’t a hesitation, of course I’ll help you, you know?” she said.

“Oh my god, she’s amazing. I don’t know how she does the stuff she does,” 1980 player Neal Broten said.

“We say she’s herding cats, is what she’s doing. We’d be lost without her,” 1980 player Mike Ramsey said.

It was a couple of players from that miracle team that helped convince Million to apply for what would be her next job, the commissioner of the Western Collegiate Hockey Association out in Minnesota.

“I’m like, I don’t even know what a commissioner does. Why would I go for that?” she remembers.

It turns out that the requirements for the job were very similar to what she did at ORDA and volunteering with the 1980 team. It’s a job that also led her to where she is today. So good at it that the U.S. national team came calling and she’s now the director and general manager of the U.S. Women’s Program.

“The opportunity to be involved in the Olympic movement and possibly go to the Olympics and compete for a gold medal with a team, I couldn’t turn it down,” she said.

And now Million is an Olympic champion.

“Standing there arm in arm with the people that you went to war with. Singing the national anthem was something that I’ll never forget,” she said.

And when Million and a few other members of the team returned home, on a flight to Minnesota, waiting for her were friends and a number of those players who won that gold 46 years ago.

“Just to show them that we watched the game and you guys did a great job and that we supported you,” Broten, whose girlfriend planned the arrival party, said.

“Well, she has no friends, so we thought we’d better get to the airport and greet her,” Ramsey joked. “No, we were excited for her and we thought we’d surprise her and it made all of us feel good.”

It’s just another moment this year that Million will never forget.