Dream Big, Then Write It Down: The Childhood Goals That Led to Kirsten Simms’ Olympic Career
When Olympic Champion Kirsten Simms was about six years old, she scratched down a handful of goals. Some smaller summer goals: jump rope 50 times in a row, hold a wall sit. Make an underage select tournament. Some big dreams: earn a spot on the U18 USA team as a double-underage player.Go to the Olympics.
It's still up there. And in February 2026 in Milan, she checked off the biggest one.
"I always use this example. It's like kids who say, 'I want to be an astronaut one day, I want to be a firefighter.' And their parents are like, 'Oh yeah, sure, for sure, yeah yeah yeah.' But your dream changes when you get older. It's like, that was me wanting to go to the Olympics. But I actually achieved that goal. I put my mind to it, and ended up achieving it…which is pretty special."
Simms is a senior forward at the University of Wisconsin. She's won two national championships and is currently preparing for the program's run in the 2026 NCAA Tournament with the Frozen Four in her sights.
Also a member of the U.S. women's hockey team and now an Olympic gold medalist, she's preparing to go pro after graduation and enter the PWHL Draft.
None of it, she'll tell you, happened by accident.
The Board. The Boys. The Blueprint.
Before she was an Olympian and a Badger, Kirsten Simms was a little girl in Michigan playing youth hockey against boys.
"I always talk about how they're gonna be bigger, they're gonna be faster, they're gonna be stronger. So you kind of have to find other ways around your game to be better than them…because there's nothing better than showing up the boys."
That competitive fire lit early. Some of the kids she faced on the ice are now in the NHL. One recently signed a seven-year contract with the Blackhawks. She was checking him at age seven or eight.
When she eventually crossed over into girls' hockey, she carried that same mentality with her: always play up. Always chase the next level before you're supposed to be ready for it. She watched older girls like Casey O'Brien and Abby Murphy make USA teams as double-underage players, and didn't just admire it from a distance.
She wrote it on her wall.
"I'd see these older girls do that, and I was like, 'Oh my gosh, I want to try and do that.' So I put it on my list from a young age."
This is the spirit of Kirsten Simms' career: she identifies a goal that might seem just slightly out of reach, watches someone else do it, decides she wants it too, and then goes and gets it. Repeat, from age six onward.
When Practice Feels Like Competition
Ask Simms what separates championship-winning teams from the ones that fall short, and she doesn't point to talent. She points to practice.
"If you can go into practice acting like it's game seven of a Stanley Cup final…when you get into a national championship game, or a gold medal game, it just comes naturally. That spirit and that fire under you, it just stems through the entire group."
At Wisconsin, she's seen both sides of it. Two national titles. One finals loss. She's clear that sometimes, even with the right mentality, the chips don't fall your way. But she's equally clear that competing every single day as if the game is on the line is what builds the muscle to win when it actually is.
That culture carried over to the Olympic team, too. A group assembled from players scattered across colleges and pro leagues, who had to find their footing as a unit fast.
"When you get to the highest levels, everybody loves the game, everybody wants to get better, everybody's competitive, but also everybody has fun doing it. And when you have that level of fun in a whole locker room, it creates a pretty special unit on the ice."
She credits the veterans (players like captain Hilary Knight) for setting the tone, for pulling younger players in quickly, and for making it clear from day one that no one gets to be on the outside looking in.
"They don't want you to be nervous. They don't want you to be shy. They want to try and bring you out of your shell as quickly as possible."
Loving the Game
There's a version of this story that is all achievement, all gold medals and list-checking. But Simms is thoughtful about how her mindset sustains a career of longevity, and it isn't just drive.
It's genuine love for the sport.
"I just love hockey. As simple as that. I fell in love with it from such a young age and I had just such a passion for it. I’m straight up a hockey nerd at heart."
She describes herself as someone who actually enjoys being challenged and being told what to work on. But equally as sustaining, she says, are the people. The teammates who became best friends. The girls she played with at twelve who stood beside her on Olympic ice.
That community, she says, is as much a part of what keeps her going as her love for competition itself.
ABOUT THIS SERIES
I'm Amy Wotovich, and I am on a mission to interview 100% of Team USA's 2026 Olympic and Paralympic athletes to create the most comprehensive mindset record of a single Games cycle. What do elite competitors actually believe about pressure, identity, failure, and joy? Kirsten Simms is one of hundreds of athletes sharing their unfiltered answers. Follow the journey!
