MILAN, ITALY– for Army soldier Jen Lee, serving in the blazing desert of Iraq, to his tragic motorcycle accident, which cost him his leg. His recovery at U.S. service personnel at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas helped him find his new passion: Sled Hockey.

“I was like, ‘What the heck is sled hockey?’” he said.  Its rules are quite similar to ice hockey, but players sit on specially designed sleds that sit on top of two hockey skate blades, and each player holds two sticks that allow them to both hit the puck as well as move the sled around.

“Everything is upper body, so it was definitely tough,” Lee said.

He was told by his therapist in 2009 that he had to pick a sport as part of his rehabilitation.

Lee will be mining the net for Team USA, as our arch rival Canada will once again meet in the Gold Medal Game. USA and Canada hockey is hands down the sports rivalry of the decade.

Should the United States once again defeat Canada, skating in a frenzy of national pride draped in the American flag, it will be yet another Gold Medal.

It’s an old adage in sports-defense wins championships- in United States hockey, Goalies win Gold.

Connor Hellebuyck for the men’s team was dominant, becoming a national hero. Ditto for Aerin Frankel, keying their 2026 Winter Olympic gold medal victory with a historic three-shutout performance.

Its time for the Trifecta.

The United States could become the first country to sweep all three Olympic and Paralympic hockey tournaments. The country’s men and women claimed double gold in the Olympic tournament in Milan in February, with both wins coming against Canada.

“Not just a dream come true, but a surreal experience, for sure,” he said on NBC Local’s “My New Favorite Olympian”

 

Jen Lee was born in Taipei, Taiwan, and moved to San Francisco at age six. In high school, he competed in track and field and basketball. He enlisted in the U.S. Army after high school. Lee had his left leg amputated above the knee when it was injured in a motorcycle accident in 2009.

He was introduced to sled hockey by “Operation Comfort,” an organization dedicated to assisting injured U.S. service personnel at the Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas.

As a sophomore in high school, he became inspired to join the military after seeing the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001.

“I felt the sense of patriotism for the first time being here … as an immigrant,” he said. “I felt the sense of everyone coming together.”

He enlisted in the Army as a helicopter mechanic in 2005 and began his military career in Hawaii, where he took up motorcycle riding. Two years later, he was deployed to Iraq. In 2009, he thought his days of serving his country in combat and playing sports came to a sudden and devastating end.

Lee was named to his first Paralympic team for U.S. sled hockey at the Paralympic Winter Games Sochi 2014 and was a backup goalie to USOPC Hall of Famer Steve Cash for 2014 and 2018 Paralympic gold-medal winning teams.

For the Paralympic Winter Games Beijing 2022, Lee was named the starting goalie and did not allow a goal in the four games he played for the United States as the sled hockey team won an unprecedented fourth straight gold medal.

Following a hard-fought 6-1 win over Czechia in the semifinals, the Americans moved on to the gold medal game for an unprecedented fifth straight time. They’ll face Canada, which took silver in Beijing four years ago, for the third consecutive tournament.

On Sunday March 15, the Ides of March, United States and Canada for Gold.  The puck drops at 11:05 AM, and will air on NBC.