From the Stands to the Roster: Kristin O’Neill and Julia Gosling’s Long Road to Canada’s Olympic Team
The path to wearing the Maple Leaf on Olympic ice is rarely smooth. For most players on Canada’s women’s hockey team headed to Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo next month, the journey has included at least one crushing moment - being cut before eventually breaking through.
That’s certainly true for Kristin O’Neill and Julia Gosling. They’re about to make their Olympic debuts, but this isn’t their first time at the Games.
They were in Beijing four years ago when Canada captured gold. But unless you were scanning the stands or the alternate list, you wouldn’t have known it.
O’Neill and Gosling were two of four alternates during the 2022 Olympics, alongside Victoria Bach and Jamie Bourbonnais. It was a role born out of necessity - a product of the COVID-19 pandemic that loomed over those Games. The alternates were essentially emergency insurance, kept at a distance in case the virus sidelined anyone from the main roster.
So while the rest of Team Canada was living the Olympic dream in the village and on the ice, O’Neill and her fellow alternates were stuck in a different kind of bubble - one that didn’t include any actual gameplay.
They watched every game from the stands, separated from their teammates by rows of empty seats. They practiced daily to stay sharp, but it was just the four of them - no scrimmages, no team drills, no real interaction with the main roster. COVID protocols kept them isolated in a Beijing hotel, shuttled to and from the rink with little else in between.
One teammate recalled only being able to wave to them from a distance. That was the extent of their connection during those three weeks.
For O’Neill, who had already played in two World Championships and felt like she was on the cusp of a major career milestone, the experience was especially tough. She wasn’t just close to the dream - she was right there, only to be told she couldn’t step on the ice.
“Honestly one of the hardest moments in my hockey career, getting released from that team,” O’Neill said from New York, where she and her teammates on the PWHL’s New York Sirens - including Bourbonnais - are riding a hot streak. “Obviously I wanted to be there so badly and be on that roster so badly, but when the opportunity came to support the team in China, it didn’t even cross my mind to say no.”
That mindset says a lot about O’Neill - and Gosling, too. It takes a special kind of resilience to stay ready in the shadows, knowing you’re good enough to be there but not allowed to fully participate. It takes even more to come back stronger and finally earn that spot outright.
Now, both O’Neill and Gosling are no longer alternates. They’re Olympians. And when they hit the ice in Italy, they’ll be doing so with the kind of perspective that only comes from being on the outside looking in.
Their journey hasn’t been linear - but then again, for Canada’s women’s hockey team, it rarely is.