EAST MEADOW, N.Y. (AP) — With less than three weeks to go before the start of the men’s hockey tournament at the Olympics in Milan, several of the top contenders have significant injury questions.
One of those looked to be answered Friday as Canada's Bo Horvat was back practicing after missing 14 of the New York Islanders' past 18 games. Horvat, who was out with a lower-body injury, had been sidelined for nine in a row but the entire time was tracking toward being healed up by February.
"There’s always that little — not doubt — but it’s in your mind, right, that hopefully it’s not too bad," Horvat said. “We knew that it wasn’t too serious, that I’ll be good to go and ready to get back for the Olympics. I was pretty confident in that.”
Horvat produced at a nearly point-a-game pace from the start of the season until the roster deadline on Dec. 31 to earn one of the final forward spots. The 30-year-old scoring center is one of just a few players picked who didn't take part in the 4 Nations Face-Off last year, and Hockey Canada general manager Doug Armstrong was kept well apprised of his status in recent weeks.
“(Islanders GM Mathieu Darche) has been in contact with Doug and their staff and just kind of keeping them updated," Horvat said. "That’s all you can ask for. I was hoping to be back as soon as possible and get some games in before the break and to go over to Milan. I’m happy to be back in this good a time, get some games in and be ready to go.”
Much like Horvat, goaltender Darcy Kuemper returned from an injury scare well ahead of the time his availability would have been in jeopardy.
Playmaker Brayden Point, one of the first six players Canada named for the Olympics, has not played for the Tampa Bay Lightning since his right leg bent awkwardly during a game at Philadelphia on Jan. 12.
Jon Cooper, the Lightning and Canada's coach, told reporters in Pittsburgh the following day of Point they “avoided the worst-case scenario (as) his season is not over.”
Point is considered week to week, and the two-time Stanley Cup champion's status could go right down to the wire. Charter flights are set to take off from New York on Feb. 7, and replacements can be made to the 25-player roster up until the first game on Feb. 11.
Sam Bennett, Wyatt Johnston and Connor Bedard figure to be among the most likely options if Point cannot go.
Seth Jones, who helped Florida win the Stanley Cup last season after being picked up before the trade deadline, earlier this week became the first injured player replaced on an Olympic roster when USA Hockey announced Jackson LaCombe would take his place.
“A very fluid, active defenseman, always in the rush,” said forward Tage Thompson, who played with LaCombe at the world championships last year when the U.S. won the tournament for the first time since 1933. “Great shot and sees the ice really well. He’s just a smooth skater, and I think it makes the game really easy for him because he’s got a lot of hockey smarts, too.”
LaCombe and Thompson are among the five players from that team heading to Milan, along with Zach Werenski, Clayton Keller and Jeremy Swayman.
“We had such great chemistry and such a good team over there,” Thompson said after Buffalo Sabres practice Friday. “Obviously we won and it was a lot of fun, so it’s nice to be going through this new opportunity and experience with some familiar faces.”
Leo Carlsson was in line to be Sweden's No. 1 center, and Jonas Brodin was supposed to play a big role on the blue line. Instead, each has been ruled out of the Olympics because of long-term injuries. The Minnesota Wild said Thursday that Brodin underwent surgery on a lingering injury.
Fellow defenseman Victor Hedman is recovering from mid-December elbow surgery. The Lightning at the time said their captain should be back to play for Sweden at the Olympics.
Questions persist about the availability of Gabriel Landeskog, who has been out since getting hurt Jan. 4, along with fellow forward William Nylander and defenseman Oliver Ekman-Larsson. Colorado said Landeskog has an upper-body injury, so it's not the same chronic knee problem that caused him to miss two full seasons before returning in the playoffs last spring.
AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics
Tampa Bay Lightning captain Victor Hedman speaks to the media as workers begin building an NHL hockey ice rink at Raymond James Stadium Tuesday, Jan. 20, 2026, in Tampa, Fla. where the Tampa Bay Lightning will play against the Boston Bruins Feb. 1, 2026. (AP Photo/Chris O'Meara)
FILE - New York Islanders' Bo Horvat (14) reacts after scoring during the second period of an NHL hockey game against the Colorado Avalanche, Dec. 4, 2025, in Elmont, N.Y. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Police arrested anti-immigration enforcement demonstrators at Minneapolis' largest airport Friday after they overstepped their permit, officials said, as a mass mobilization to protest the Trump administration's crackdown began across Minnesota despite Arctic temperatures seizing the state.
A network of labor unions, progressive organizations and clergy had urged Minnesotans to stay away from work, school and even shops Friday to protest the immigration enforcement surge in Minneapolis and St. Paul.
“Roughly 100 clergy” were arrested, according to Trevor Cochlin of Faith in Minnesota, one of the groups organizing the protest at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport. They were protesting the involvement of Delta Airlines in the deportation of immigrants.
Metropolitan Airports Commission spokesman Jeff Lea said the protesters were arrested outside the main terminal when they went beyond the stipulations of their permit for demonstrating and disrupted airline operations. Authorities have not said how many people were detained at the airport.
Bishop Dwayne Royster, leader of the progressive organization Faith in Action, arrived in Minnesota on Wednesday from Washington, D.C.
“We want ICE out of Minnesota,” he said. “We want them out of all the cities around the country where they’re exercising extreme overreach.”
Protesters have gathered daily in the Twin Cities since Jan. 7, when Renee Good was fatally shot by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer. Federal law enforcement officers have repeatedly squared off with community members and activists who track their movements.
Organizers said Friday morning that more than 700 businesses statewide have closed in solidarity with the protest, from a bookstore in tiny Grand Marais near the Canadian border to the landmark Guthrie Theater in downtown Minneapolis.
“We’re achieving something historic,” said Kate Havelin of Indivisible Twin Cities, one of the more than 100 participating groups.
A 2-year-old named Chloe was detained with her father as they drove home from a grocery store in South Minneapolis on Thursday, according to a GoFundMe page created by Minneapolis city council member Jason Chavez.
Department of Homeland Security said in a statement that Border Patrol arrested Elvis Tipan Echeverria of Ecuador and that the toddler's mother refused to take her so she was reunited with her father at a federal detention facility.
According to an emergency petition filed in federal court, a district judge granted an emergency injunction ordering Chloe's release into the custody of her lawyer. The child, a citizen of Ecuador who was brought to Minneapolis as a newborn, has a pending asylum application and is not subject to a final order of removal.
DHS repeated its allegation Friday that the father of 5-year-old Liam Ramos abandoned him during his arrest by immigration officers in Columbia Heights on Tuesday, leading to the child being detained, too.
Department spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin said Liam was detained because his father, Adrian Alexander Conejo Arias, “fled from the scene.” The two are detained together at the Dilley Detention Center in Texas, which is intended to hold families. McLaughlin said officers tried to get Liam's mother to take him, but she refused to accept custody.
The family’s attorney Marc Prokosch said he thinks the mother refused to open the door to the ICE officers because she was afraid she would be detained. Columbia Heights district superintendent Zena Stenvik said Liam was “used as bait.”
Prokosch found nothing in state records to suggest Liam's father has a criminal history.
On Friday, Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino sought to shift the narrative away from Liam's detention by attacking the news media for, in his view, insufficient coverage of children who have lost parents to violence by people in the country illegally. After briefly mentioning the 5-year-old during a news conference, he talked about a mother of five who was killed in August 2023.
On Thursday, a prominent civil rights attorney and at least two other people were arrested for their involvement in an anti-immigration enforcement protest that disrupted a Sunday service at a church in St. Paul. At least two of them remained in federal custody Friday morning.
Black Lives Matter Grassroots, a national hub for local BLM chapters, on Friday expressed its “gratitude” for those activists.
“Grassroots organizers in the Twin Cities are putting their own bodies, freedom and livelihood on the line to secure community,” according to a statement from the organization. “Our courageous freedom fighters who put themselves on the line to protect humanity deserve our gratitude.”
The mass mobilization coincides with a blast of cold air hitting the Upper Midwest and ahead of a severe winter storm that is expected to affect millions.
Organizers hope Friday’s mobilization will be the largest coordinated protest action to date, with a march in downtown Minneapolis planned for Friday afternoon. Early Friday afternoon, the temperature in Minneapolis was minus 12 with a wind chill of minus 28 (minus 24 Celsius with a wind chill of minus 33 Celsius).
Havelin compared the presence of immigration officers in Minnesota to the winter weather warnings.
“Minnesotans understand that when we’re in a snow emergency … we all have to respond and it makes us do things differently,” she said. “And what’s happening with ICE in our community, in our state, means that we can’t respond as business as usual.”
Somali businesses especially have lost sales during the enforcement surge as workers and customers, fearing detention, stay at home.
Many schools were planning to close Friday, but cited different reasons. The University of Minnesota and the St. Paul public school district said there would be no in-person classes because of the extreme cold. Minneapolis Public Schools were scheduled to be closed “for a teacher record keeping day.”
Associated Press journalists Jack Brook and Tiffany Stanley in Washington contributed.
Candles burn around a poem written by Renee Nicole Good during a vigil honoring Good, outside the State Capitol, in St. Paul, Minn., Friday, Jan. 9, 2026, (Kerem Yücel/Minnesota Public Radio via AP)
People visit a makeshift memorial for Renee Good, who was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
An image depicting Renee Good, who was fatally shot by an ICE officer last week, adorns a makeshift memorial for her in Minneapolis, Wednesday, Jan. 14, 2026. (AP Photo/Adam Gray)
Federal agents stand guard, Wednesday, Jan. 21, 2026, in Minneapolis. (AP Photo/Angelina Katsanis)
