WEST ORANGE, N.J. — At just 20-years-old, Ohio State junior Joy Dunne is the youngest player on Team USA’s women’s Olympic hockey roster. It’s something her older sister — New York Sirens defender Jincy Roese — knows a thing or two about.
“I think you’re just a sponge at that age. You just want to absorb all you can,” Roese said at Sirens practice Thursday. “There’s so many people you can learn from. I know that’s my sister’s attitude right now.”
Roese made her international debut as a 15-year-old defender on the USA Four Nations Cup squad in 2012. Her oldest teammate, Julie Chu, was 15 years her senior. Nonetheless, Roese helped the Americans finish first ahead of a Canadian squad headed by a pair of Hall of Famers — 35-year-old Jayna Hefford and 34-year-old Hayley Wickenheiser.
Dunne didn’t make her Olympic debut as a teenager, but she’s the Americans’ youngest player on the roster by nearly seven months. USA captain Hilary Knight has the St. Louis native beat by 16 years.
“She’s young, and she wants to bring what she can to the table,” Roese explained. “But also, like, take it all in and enjoy it and ask all the questions she can.”
Dunne hasn’t looked out of place on the ice. The dynamic forward scored her first Olympic goal in the opener against Czechia, and gelled on a fourth line with fellow NCAA stars Tessa Janecke and Kirsten Simms. Dunne recorded four points (two goals, two assists) in four preliminary-round games. She tied for fifth in team scoring, trailing only Caroline Harvey, Alex Carpenter, Abbey Murphy, and Knight.
With a WCHA Rookie of the Year and Patty Kazmaier Award Top 10 Finalist nod under her belt in three seasons with the Buckeyes, Dunne is already a household name in the world of women’s hockey, and a projected first-round pick when she becomes eligible for the PWHL Draft in 2027. But her breakout moment on the international stage came Monday, in USA’s 5-0 win over Switzerland.
Dunne notched her second tally of these Games in the second period, and assisted Carpenter and Harvey on the final two goals of the night — a three-point outing for the only player on the American roster born in 2005.
Roese recorded three points across seven games in the 2022 Beijing Olympics — her lone Olympic appearance to date — helping USA to a silver medal. The 28-year-old defender wasn’t selected for Team USA’s roster this time around, but that doesn’t stop her unwavering support of her younger sister.
“Joy is an amazing athlete, and she’s worked really hard at it. She’s just better than me at the game,” Roese chuckled. “Like, there’s no jealousy in that. She’s just so gifted, and as her older sister, I’m her sister before I’m anything else. I’m proud of her, and I want to see her go on and do amazing things.
“We’re each other’s biggest champions and supporters, and there is no jealousy amongst us. And I think that that’s super, super special and rare to have.”
It may be rare to have, but that’s not the case in the Dunne household.
Jincy and Joy are two of six siblings in a hockey family that also includes Josh Dunne, a forward in the NHL for the Buffalo Sabres. Roese overlapped with the eldest sibling, Jessica, at Ohio State for the better part of two seasons.
“I know my older sister kind of got caught in my shadow in a lot of ways,” Roese told The Athletic’s Jeremy Rutherford in March 2025. “She was such a good player in her own right but never got the full respect that she deserved. She had an opportunity to be jealous, but she was the greatest big sister you can imagine.”
Jessica’s selflessness set the mold that Roese and the rest of the Dunne siblings follow.
“I think that changed my whole trajectory as a player in general, knowing that she was in a position where she probably felt very overlooked just in general, and she chose to take the route to support me and love me and lift me up,” Roese said Thursday. “It’s hard to put into words what that does for you. She definitely set that example for me — [jealousy] wasn’t even an option when Joy and Josey came around. I think that all my siblings are going to go on past their hockey careers and do things that are more amazing than I’ve done in my life. And I’m just going to be so proud of them.”
Joy is the youngest of the six, trailing Jessica (29), Jincy (28), Josh (27), Josey (24), and James (22). Each one played hockey until the collegiate level, while Jincy and Josh went on to play professionally. That comes with its own benefits — although Roese insists the siblings can’t take all the credit.
“Where the siblings came in helpful was that she was able to gather some resources early on — how to navigate the game and grow and learn, how to ask questions,” Roese explained. “But in terms of just her ability, that’s all her. She’s a freak athlete. She’s athletically more dominant than the rest of us. I would say she’s stronger, she’s bigger, she’s faster, she has great hockey IQ, and I think those were all things that we had nothing to do with. That’s just her and her own work ethic.”
Jincy Roese notes shift in Team USA talent
Dunne is far from the only young player making waves for Team USA in the 2026 Winter Games. Five NCAA skaters can be found on the Americans’ Top 10 points leaderboard ahead of the Olympic play-offs. That includes Harvey, the University of Wisconsin defender who tied Germany’s Laura Kluge for the overall lead in scoring (seven points) and paced all skaters with a plus-10 rating.
Roese overlapped with the then-19-year-old Harvey — or ‘KK’ as her teammates know her — on Team USA in 2022, although the University of Wisconsin defender served a more limited role four years ago.
“Where Caroline’s come from, not having played much at the last Olympics, and not letting her confidence get down. I’m so proud of the kid,” Roese said. “That’s one of the hardest things to do. It doesn’t matter that you’re young. You go out there, and you play, you set an example — and she does that.”
The USA blue line also features Harvey’s Wisconsin teammate, Laila Edwards, who became the first African American player to represent the American women’s hockey team. Edwards scored her first Olympic goal Tuesday in a 5-0 rout of Canada; she’s tied with Dunne, Hannah Bilka, and Megan Keller at four points overall (one goal, three assists).
“Laila is a rock star,” Roese lauded. “From being on forward to being put on D, I imagine that was really hard for her, but I think it was a great move. She’s a fantastic defenseman, and I love seeing her do her thing out there.”
Edwards, Harvey, and Dunne are part of a larger youth moment that has the U.S. poised to contend for gold at the international stage for years to come. It’s a surge in the American talent pool that Roese noticed five to six years ago.
“When you have Janecke and Murphy and Haley Winn and ‘KK’ and Laila and Joy entering the scene, you’re kind of like, ‘oh wow, these girls are good.'”
That they are — and Roese will have a firsthand view for the foreseeable future.
