USA women’s hockey team inspires Harlem nonprofit through Olympic watch party

NEW YORK -- Ice Hockey in Harlem went worldwide for about one minute, those 60 seconds of free publicity an education of what playing means to boys and girls living and growing up in Upper Manhattan and the connection to a 22-year-old trailblazer named Laila Edwards.

Team USA led Team Canada 3-0 with 12:35 to play in the second period of a preliminary round game at the Olympic Winter Games Milano Cortina 2026 on Tuesday when NBC cameras cut to the back of Edwards' No. 10. Sideline reporter Kathryn Tappen began telling a story about a senior forward-turned-defenseman from the University of Wisconsin being the first Black athlete to skate for the United States women at the Olympics.

Tappen then followed through on a tip shared off camera by play-by-play announcer Kenny Albert, a watch party held on the Upper West Side. A gathering of coaches and youth players were already euphoric how the United States were dominating their international rivals. That turned into delirium when the USA Network segued to footage inside The Gin Mill Speakeasy reacting to Kirsten Simms' goal 1:18 into the second that gave the U.S. its three-goal lead, one confirmed by video review and upheld after a challenge for goalie interference.

The report continued with proceeds from the watch party going to Ice Hockey in Harlem, a nonprofit that for 38 years and counting offers free hockey and academic enrichment programs to children ages 5-18 from the Harlem community, and this year will engage 150 boys and girls by giving access to a full hockey program.

To say that IHIH executive director Malik Garvin didn't see it coming is not completely accurate. Albert is a friend and supporter of the program and received a text from Garvin during a break. What Garvin didn't know was how far NBC Sports decided to take the story.

That's when Garvin had to take a moment to gather himself.

"It's definitely shocking, surprising," Garvin said. "It feels so good for me, for the kids and the parents in this program to be exposed and receive exposure for the things that they do on a national scale. They make sacrifices as hockey parents and as hockey players and often go overlooked or not thought about again. We're an inner-city nontraditional program. We're not going to be in any news articles or winning state championships, but our kids go out, work hard and become better people through it."

A 5-0 win for the U.S. clinched Group A, with the team going undefeated in four games while outscoring opponents 20-1. For good measure, Edwards completed the scoring by evading three defenders and skating into open ice to beat goalie Ann-Renee Desbiens top shelf at 11:53 of the third for her first goal and fourth point of the tournament.

On the 10th day of Black History Month, messaging was clearer than Team USA's superiority: Edwards isn't just a history maker. She's a tremendous hockey player and an advocate for Ice Hockey in Harlem to exalt its own game.

"I'd say it's a bit storybook," Garvin said, "and that's just from the good nature of the kind of person that she is and programs out there like this that do great things for great families. Amazed, overwhelmed, stunned."

Watching from another bar across the street were Emma Alenka and Evan Harris. They were unfamiliar with Ice Hockey in Harlem, even with Alenka being a former player at Hanover High School (New Hampshire) and acquaintances with U.S. goalie Aerin Frankel and forward Hayley Scamurra. Harris, while living in Harlem, never gave a second thought of seeing kids walking through the neighborhood carrying skates.

All that changed during those 60 seconds. Alenka and Harris walked downstairs and donated $60 among proceeds that included four raffle drawings with JoAnn Blackett, Garvin's mother, winning an IHIH T-shirt. The universe went to work by connecting the program with Harris, whose hometown of Chagrin Falls, Ohio, is 20-30 minutes from Edwards' native Cleveland Heights.

Storybook.

"It seems like it's kind of like a great structured program for kids, and with homework and skating and community stuff," Harris said. "It seems like it's really awesome."

The first chapter of Edwards and IHIH was penned when eight girls visited Madison, Wisconsin, for a locker room tour, meet-and-greet with Edwards, defenseman Caroline "KK" Harvey and Chayla Edwards, Laila's older sister and a Wisconsin defenseman from 2019-24. One of the eight was Vaneshka Caraballo, a 17-year-old defenseman who is headed to Buffalo State University and trying out for the hockey team. No matter how far the journey goes as a player, the fundamentals and life lessons gifted by the game have given her enough confidence to pursue a major in business administration and sports management.

Caraballo's long-term goal is reuniting with Garvin and continuing his life's work. Her muse is seeing Edwards elevate the spirit of dreamers.

"She's the first Black woman to play in the Olympics, United States, which is amazing and incredible," Caraballo said. "And she gives more opportunities, like the kids that we have here, just to see that they can be whatever they want to be, and they can come from wherever they come from, just to be here in the United States."

Harvey's goal at 3:45 of the first gave Team USA a 1-0 lead and made an immediate statement on the ice, with Hilary Knight's secondary assist giving her 32 points (14 goals, 18 assists) to tie Jenny Potter's U.S. record since women began playing in the Olympics at the 1998 Nagano Games. Edwards scoring was the coup de grace for the U.S, which continued its dominance following its four-game sweep of Canada at the 2025 Rivalry Series, which it won by a combined score of 24-7.

Even in the glow of going global for that minute, Garvin said it's another day, another event to show and tell young girls they can do anything and that the game of hockey is for them. A brand-new audience is ready to learn more and the doors are wide open.

"Layla scoring isn't the cherry on top, it's just the beginning," Garvin said. "It's the beginning for her. It's the beginning for girls all over the country, different girls of different races, etc., and certainly for Ice Hockey in Harlem girls."