‘Always Been My Dream’—U.S. Soccer Star Set for 2026 Winter Olympics

The vice captain of Stanford’s women’s soccer team Sammy Smith is a dual-sport star heading to Italy in February.

Sammy Smith is a two-sport sensation at Stanford. | Sophia Scheller/NCAA Photos/Getty Images

Two months after starting on the backline in the 2025 NCAA College Cup championships match with Stanford, Sammy Smith will be poised on another line—the start line at the Milano-Cortina 2026 Olympics, as one of Team USA’s 16 cross-country skiing athletes. 

The 20-year-old native of Boise, Idaho, has balanced soccer and cross-country skiing throughout her time at Stanford and is set to become the first student-athlete from the university to compete at the Winter Olympics in a sport other than their varsity sport since 1984.

Smith earned her Olympic qualification with wins in the skate sprint and classic sprint, two separate cross-country events in the U.S. Cross-Country Championships in January in Lake Placid, New York, the site of the 1932 and 1980 Olympics.

Those victories came less than a month after Stanford women’s soccer reached the national championship game, where they faced off against Florida State.

“We were homeschooled up here until I was in eighth grade. My parents knew how much of a benefit it is to be on snow for those concentrated periods of time and gave my siblings the best chance we could to do that,” Smith told the Olympics, about balancing soccer and skiing growing up. 

“It’s always been my dream to represent the U.S. at the Olympic level—and to do it in both skiing and soccer.”

Since qualifying, Smith has finished 12th in a World Cup sprint event in Oberhof, Germany, as she continues to ramp up for the Olympics.

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A Different Team USA

Sammy Smith has represented Team USA at the U-17 World Cup and Pan Am Games in soccer. | Grega Valancic/VOIGT/GettyImages

When Smith clips into her skis in Italy, it won’t be her first time representing Team USA at a major competition. Previously, she represented the U.S. women’s national youth teams at the 2022 FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in India, as well as the U-19 team at the 2023 Pan American Games against senior competition in Santiago, Chile. 

The U.S. topped the group stage at the 2022 U-17 World Cup, then fell to Nigeria in a penalty shootout and crashed out of the tournament in the quarterfinals. At the Pan Am Games, Smith’s American side won the bronze medal, beating Argentina in the third-place match, with Smith playing 81 minutes. 

While Smith has not been to the Summer Olympics, she is one of several multi-sport athletes to reach elite levels in their discipline. Previously, she also played tailback, cornerback and placekicked and punted on the school football team

Eleven American athletes have competed in the Summer and Winter Olympics in different sports, most recently at Tokyo 2020. At the 2026 Games, however, former collegiate soccer player and Team Canada athlete, Kelsey Mitchell, will achieve the rare feat of a third sport, having won Olympic gold in women’s cycling at the Tokyo 2020 Games after moving on from soccer, before transitioning to bobsleigh and qualifying for Milano-Cortina. 

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How to Watch Smith at the 2026 Winter Olympics

The cross-country skiing competition at Milano-Cortina 2026 will take place at the Tesero Cross-Country Skiing Stadium in Lago di Tesero, Italy, in the Val di Fiemme region of the Dolomites from Feb. 7 to Feb. 22. 

NBC and USA Network will broadcast and stream the Olympic Games in the United States, with a full event and broadcast schedule, featuring replays available here.

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