{"id":387283,"date":"2026-01-02T21:56:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-02T21:56:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/387283\/"},"modified":"2026-01-02T21:56:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T21:56:12","slug":"islanders-emil-heineman-a-surprise-sweden-snub-for-2026-winter-olympics-as-simon-holmstrom-also-misses-cut","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/387283\/","title":{"rendered":"Islanders\u2019 Emil Heineman a surprise Sweden snub for 2026 Winter Olympics as Simon Holmstrom also misses cut"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Tre Kronor will have noll Islanders.<\/p>\n<p>Neither Emil Heineman nor Simon Holmstrom were named to Team Sweden\u2019s Olympic squad Friday in a surprise snub for Heineman in particular.<\/p>\n<p>Heineman appeared to be in good shape to get on the plane to Milan with 12 goals, six assists and an ascension into the Islanders\u2019 top six in what\u2019s been an excellent season in New York.<\/p>\n<p>His ability to play on any line and on the penalty kill were reasons to think he\u2019d be selected as well.<\/p>\n<p>Holmstrom was seen as a <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/01\/01\/sports\/islanders-rookie-matthew-schaefer-not-bothered-by-olympics-snub\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">longer shot to make the roster<\/a> given his offensive inconsistency this season, but there was still a chance Sweden would have wanted his defensive and penalty-killing abilities.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38077602\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/new-york-islanders-left-wing-117069810.jpg\" alt=\"New York Islanders left wing Emil Heineman (51) celebrates his winning goal.\" class=\"wp-image-38077602\"  \/>Emil Heineman did not qualify for Team Sweden. Dennis Schneidler-Imagn Images<\/p>\n<p>Instead, the brass led by general manager Josef Boumedienne and coach Sam Hallam pulled a handful of surprises in its forward corps.<\/p>\n<p>Lightning winger Pontus Holmberg and Sharks center Alex Wennberg, a former Ranger, were both named, though neither were on the 4 Nations roster that finished third a year ago.<\/p>\n<p>Heineman may not have even been the most surprising snub, with Minnesota\u2019s Marcus Johansson and Calgary\u2019s Mikael Backlund both left off, as well as Bruins winger Elias Lindholm.<\/p>\n<p>In the defense corps, Mattias Ekholm didn\u2019t make it, with Phillip Broberg getting the nod instead.<\/p>\n<p>On Tuesday in Chicago, Heineman said that representing his country would be \u201ca dream come true.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"38077612\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/simon-holmstrom-10-new-york-118046603.jpg\" alt=\"Simon Holmstrom of the New York Islanders on ice.\" class=\"wp-image-38077612\"  \/>Simon Holmstrom also did not make the cut. NHLI via Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou always fight to be a part of that,\u201d he said. \u201cAt the same time, you\u2019re always looking forward a little to see what the roster\u2019s gonna be, no matter what. You cheer for your country. We have a lot of great players. It\u2019ll be fun to see no matter what.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>It stands to reason that Heineman and Holmstrom would both be part of the pool of potential injury replacements if someone were to get hurt.<\/p>\n<p>How high they\u2019d be on that list, though, is less clear.<\/p>\n<p>Coach Patrick Roy told reporters following Friday\u2019s practice that <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/01\/01\/sports\/bo-horvat-suffers-apparent-injury-in-islanders-worry\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Bo Horvat (lower body)<\/a> won\u2019t play this week.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re gonna re-evaluate him after the week,\u201d Roy said.<\/p>\n<p>Ilya Sorokin will dress Saturday as the backup goaltender against the Maple Leafs for the first time since suffering a lower-body injury before the holiday break.<\/p>\n<p>Roy said the plan is to play Sorokin against the Devils on Tuesday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tre Kronor will have noll Islanders. Neither Emil Heineman nor Simon Holmstrom were named to Team Sweden\u2019s Olympic&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":387284,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5110],"tags":[5,122,3328,159,5190,5189,4,4652,43,1718,2787],"class_list":{"0":"post-387283","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-islanders","8":"tag-hockey","9":"tag-islanders","10":"tag-new-york","11":"tag-new-york-islanders","12":"tag-newyork","13":"tag-newyorkislanders","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-simon-holmstrom","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-sweden","18":"tag-winter-olympics"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/115827742186020321","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387283","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=387283"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/387283\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/387284"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=387283"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=387283"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=387283"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}