By FERNANDA FIGUEROA and KEN MAGUIRE

MILAN (AP) — Olympic hockey knows all about big hits.

That now includes “Heated Rivalry” a gay hockey romance TV series in which two players from opposing teams carry out a secret, long-term relationship.

The steamy connection between the characters — Canadian Shane Hollander and Russian Ilya Rozanov — has attracted fans to both the show and the sport itself, with the NHL seeing a boost in ticket sales by one estimate.

The show’s impact was evident long before the Milan Cortina Olympics when co-stars Hudson Williams and Connor Storrie carried the Olympic flame. And it hasn’t stopped there. Athletes and fans from Canada and the U.S. are feeling the show’s impact.

Athletes recognize the phenomenon

Zach Werenski, a defenseman on the U.S. team who plays for the NHL’s Columbus Blue Jackets, said the show has come up in conversation in the locker room.

“Everyone is saying how great it is, I just haven’t seen it yet,” Werenski told The Associated Press after a 5-1 victory over Latvia. “It’s definitely good for the sport of hockey. Whenever you can add more eyes to the game and have people talk about the game and talk about inclusivity, I think it’s just great for the sport.”

Jake Sanderson, another U.S. defenseman who plays for the Ottawa Senators, said he has heard about the show but doesn’t know much about it. When asked how far off the NHL is from having an openly gay player, Sanderson cited Luke Prokop. In 2021, Prokop was a Nashville Predators prospect who became the first player signed to an NHL contract to come out, though he has not yet played in the league.

“You never know if that show (will) instill some confidence in some people,” said Sanderson, adding that any openly gay player would be fully accepted in the locker room. “I don’t think we would treat them any differently. They’re our teammate, we love them no matter what, and obviously embrace them, absolutely.”

Rachel Reid’s novel “Heated Rivalry” was published in 2019 as part of a series. The TV adaptation, originally developed for Canadian streaming service Crave, was the top-rated series on HBO Max in its first season. It has been renewed for a second season.

Its biggest fans at the Olympics may be the Canadian delegation.

As part of the Olympic experience, athletes were gifted a potted plant. Many of the Canadians named theirs Shane or Ilya, according to the delegation’s lead press liaison, Tara MacBournie.

Canadian Alpine skier Kiki Alexander took the love a bit further, sharing on her TikTok that the village’s Canadian moose has been named Shane.

“If you know, you know,” she wrote.

Adam van Koeverden, a 2004 Olympic champion in canoeing who is now Canada’s secretary of state for sport, is a fan of the show.

“We’re the perfect country to be having the conversation and be putting that art out there that I think is advancing the conversation on diversity in hockey,” van Koeverden told AP at the Games. “Hockey is for everyone and ‘Heated Rivalry’ makes it clear.”

The show launched in Europe in January and is proving a surprise hit in Russia, despite the country’s anti-LGBTQ+ crackdowns. Because of the war in Ukraine, the IOC has allowed just a handful of Russian athletes to compete at the Milan Cortina Games as neutral individuals but no teams.

Fans of hockey and ‘Heated Rivalry’

Athletes aren’t the only ones riding the “Heated Rivalry” wave. Kim Sweet of Calgary, Alberta, is only on Episode 3 but is loving it.

Related Articles

Slalom is Mikaela Shiffrin’s last shot at an Olympic medal in Italy. Good news? It’s her best event

Women’s hockey: It’s U.S.-Canada for gold, and this time the Americans are favorites

Olympic curling: Previously winless Italy upsets Team USA

Trying to tame the Olympic controversy, World Curling sent in the umps. Then it sent them away

White Bear Lake speedskater Birkeland earned her Olympic swan song, and plans to savor it

“The show has me very intrigued,” Sweet, 50, said before entering the arena to watch Canada play Czechia last week. “How a very male-dominated sport has two guys having to work through the privacy of it all, and whether you ever want to come out.”

“It’s great having more eyes on the sport,” added Sweet, who describes herself as “a huge hockey fan.”

Angie Campos, a California resident, was also in attendance and wearing a sweatshirt featuring the jerseys of the show’s two main characters.

Campos is new to hockey, drawn to it by the series, and she isn’t alone. Weekly NHL hockey ticket sales saw a more than 20% rise after the show first aired in late November, according to data from ticketing platform SeatGeek. It saw no similar surge the same period a year earlier.

“The series didn’t just light up social media feeds, it may have sent fans straight to hockey games themselves,” SeatGeek said in its analysis Jan. 16. “While it’s impossible to attribute all of this growth to a single show, the timing is hard to ignore.”

Campos likened her newfound fandom and that of fellow “Heated Rivalry” viewers to the surge of female NFL fans after Taylor Swift started dating Kansas City Chiefs player Travis Kelce and attending games.

“It just makes it a little bit more relatable and it has definitely opened eyes to a human side of competition,” she said.

More representation in hockey

Hockey is a rough-and-tumble sport with occasional fighting and hard hits, even in crucial games where a penalty can prove costly. Canada’s Tom Wilson and French player Pierre Crinon were ejected for fighting in Canada’s win on Sunday.

All the machismo and aggression make the rink — and hockey in general — an unlikely and provocative setting to explore the delicate feelings of forbidden love and taboos around male sexual orientation. No active NHL player has come out as gay in the century-plus existence of the league.

“Heated Rivalry” has been wildly popular among women, but men are starting to find the appeal.

At the Canada-France game, Christopher Ryan York, 20, said he has hopped on the bandwagon, too. It was hard not to watch the show given how popular it has become, he said, and he’s happy it’s creating new hockey fans.

“Anything to grow the sport, for sure,” he added.

His father Kevin York, 60, said he hasn’t seen the show, but can’t stop hearing about it back home in Alberta and believes it must be truly inspirational if it spurred a Canadian hockey player to come out as gay: Jesse Kortuem of Vancouver, who stepped away from the game at 17 for fear he wouldn’t be accepted, shared his coming-out statement on Instagram on Jan. 13.

“Something has sparked in me (ok — yes credit to #HeatedRivalry),” he wrote. “I thought I would share because I want to speak to the athletes out there who are still in the closet or struggling to find their way. I want you to know that there is hope and you’re not alone.”

Associated Press writer Jennifer McDermott contributed to this report.

AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/milan-cortina-2026-winter-olympics

By KIMBERLEE KRUESI

A shooter unleashed a flurry of bullets during a Rhode Island youth hockey game, killing two people and injuring three others, in an attack that was cut short when a spectator stepped in to help stop the tragedy, authorities said.

Investigators had spoken to nearly 100 witnesses as of Monday evening as they attempt to piece together what happened early Monday afternoon inside the Dennis M. Lynch Arena in Pawtucket, a few miles outside Providence.

Related Articles

Elevate Prize winners gain more than $300K in funding. They learn to better tell their own stories

Tony Clark resigning as head of MLB players union, AP source says, as possible cap fight looms

Delaware man married in the 1970s to former first lady Jill Biden pleads not guilty in wife’s death

Thomas Pritzker steps down from Hyatt board saying he deeply regrets association with Epstein

Some calm returns to Wall Street as US stocks hold steadier following last week’s AI-induced swings

Pawtucket Police Chief Tina Goncalves said Monday that the shooter died from an apparent self-inflicted gun wound, though authorities are still investigating.

Goncalves credited an unnamed “good Samaritan” who intervened, bringing the attack “to a swift end.” She did not provide details.

It is not entirely clear what precipitated the shooting, who was targeted or why. Unverified video circulating on social media shows players on the ice as popping sounds are heard. Chaos quickly unfolds as players on benches dive for cover, those on the ice frantically skate toward exits and fans flee their seats.

“It appears that this was a targeted event, that it may be a family dispute,” she said. Authorities said both people who died were adults but have not released the identities of the victims.

Goncalves identified the shooter as Robert Dorgan, who she said also went by the name Roberta Esposito, who was born in 1969.

Monday’s shooting came nearly two months after Rhode Island was rocked by a shooting at Brown University that left two students dead and wounded nine others, as well as a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor. Authorities later found Claudio Neves Valente, 48, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound at a New Hampshire storage facility.

A map showing the location of a deadly shooting in Pawtucket, Rhode Island. (AP Digital Embed)

“Our state is grieving again,” Rhode Island Gov. Dan McKee said in a statement. “As governor, a parent, and a former coach, my heart breaks for the victims, families, students, and everyone impacted by the devastating shooting at Lynch Arena in Pawtucket.”

Amaya Battle is a meat-and-potatoes basketball player. The Gophers’ senior guard can fill up the stat sheet in a variety of ways — points, rebounds, assists and on the defensive end.

Off the court, the Hopkins High School grauate has fine-tuned reverse searing a ribeye steak to get optimal pinkness, and will pair that protein with a choice of starch and vegetable at one of her regular “steak night” dinners with teammates.

“Potatoes can come different ways like French fries, mashed potatoes, copped breakfast potatoes,” said teammate Tori McKinney. “That’s like Maya. She can do anything, whatever you’re needing, whatever you’re craving.”

Minnesota guard Amaya Battle (3) brings the ball into the offensive zone against Wisconsin forward Kyrah Daniels during the Gophers’ 83-60 victory Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026, at Kohl Center in Madison, Wis. (Meghan Bielich/Gophers Athletics)

Battle and U legend Rachel Banham are the only two players in program history to register more than 1,000 career points, 600 rebounds and 500 assists. And Battle is the only active NCAA women’s player to eclipse 1,000 points, 700 boards and 500 assists. Her four-year career and the Gophers’ current season are coming to a crescendo.

With Battle as a team leader, Minnesota has won eight straight games and is ranked 23rd in this week’s Associated Press poll. The U have two tough Big Ten tests at Williams Arena this week: No. 10 Ohio State at 7 p.m. Wednesday and No. 18 Michigan State at 5 p.m. Sunday.

“Amaya has meant a great, great deal to our program,” third-year head coach Dawn Plitzuweit said last week. “She is someone that we rely on in so many different ways.”

Battle was one-fourth of the Gophers’ 10th-ranked national recruiting class in 2022. A year later, head coach Lindsay Whalen was let go while classmates Niamya Holloway had a freshman season ruined by a knee injury, Mara Braun had the next two seasons undercut by foot injuries, and Mallory Heyer transferred to Oregon before this year.

“A lot of ups and downs, a lot of change,” Battle said. “But, I mean, we’re still here and we’re at a good spot.”

Battle has been a reliable constant with a team-high 128 games played and has helped prime Minnesota for its first NCAA tournament appearance since 2018.

“You just kind of learn how quickly things can change and just not go your way, and just being able to take every moment and being in the precious present,” Battle said.

Gophers players endearingly call Plitzuweit by the nickname “Dawny P,” and one of her principles is to stay in the “precious present.”

Gophers point guard Amaya Battle dribbles the ball during Minnesota’s game against USC at Williams Arena on Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026 (Brady Paitrick / Gophers Athletics)

“That’s probably my favorite lesson, biggest takeaway I’ve taken from Dawny P and playing with her for these past three years,” Battle said. “It’s something that’s really impacted me, and I’ll definitely carry that with me for the rest of my life.”

Battle used that concept in a lighthearted way during the Gophers’ 91-85 win over then-No. 10 Iowa on Feb. 5.

“It was obviously a very intense game, but she just lightened up the mood by being herself,” McKinney said. “She was like, ‘Guys, I’m just having so much fun out here right now.’ We were like, ‘Wait, so are we.’ (But) we were still very locked in.”

Battle also pulls tips from her older brother, Jamison Battle, who went from George Washington to the Gophers to Ohio State and now plays with the NBA’s Toronto Raptors. The DeLaSalle alum is averaging 3.1 points in 8.5 minutes across 39 of the Raptors’ 55 games this season.

“He’s in the league; he’s made it to the highest of highs, so he must know something,” Amaya joked. “… He’s always just a pretty calm and consistent player, so (I’m) just trying to take that from him, as well.”

Those steak dinners started randomly last year. Roommate Taylor Woodson is a regular, so is McKinney. Grace Grocholski and Mara Braun come from time to time. Annika Stewart was part of last year’s group until she graduated.

The cooking of the steaks has evolved to the reverse-sear method; that starts in a low-temp oven and ends in the stovetop pan. It is now served with garlic butter, a type of potato and a veggie side. Battle really likes zucchini, but it could be asparagus or something else.

“It’s pretty basic, but we hit all that we need,” Battle said.

McKinney thinks that undersells it. “It’s gotten so good,” she said.

The same can be said about Battle’s contributions on the court.

Related Articles

Women’s basketball: Streaking Gophers crack Top 25

Women’s basketball: Gophers win big at Wisconsin

Women’s basketball: Gophers win seventh straight game

Women’s basketball: Gophers run win streak to six games

Women’s basketball: Gophers stun No. 10 Iowa

By MARÍA TERESA HERNÁNDEZ

MILAN (AP) — A 15th-century statue that once stood outside Milan’s iconic Duomo has found a new home.

The Bearded Saint with Book was recently restored under the “Adopt a Statue” program, launched in 2020 by the centuries-old institution that oversees the cathedral’s conservation. As of Feb. 13, it is on display at Piazzale Cadorna, behind a glass window at the headquarters of FNM, a Lombardy-based transport company.

People walk near the “Bearded Saint with Book” at Milan’s Cadorna station at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

The program recruits donors — either companies or individuals — to fund restoration of a statue under a loan agreement that allows it to occasionally be displayed outside the Duomo.

“The uniqueness of this project is that statues that would otherwise remain in our deposits are restored and brought back to their original beauty,” the program’s project manager, Elisa Mantia, said in an interview with The Associated Press. “In that way, they can continue to tell the story of the Duomo even in places that are far from the monument.”

The “Bearded Saint with Book” is pictured at Milan’s Cadorna station at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

These agreements are in some cases granted for an initial one-year term and may be renewed. The initiative follows previous fundraising campaigns in which donors could adopt gargoyles or spires in exchange for inclusion in the Duomo’s donor register, where contributors’ names are recorded as part of the cathedral’s long history of support.

From storage to public display

The construction of the Duomo began in 1386, under the rule of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, then lord of Milan, in collaboration with the city’s archbishop. The cathedral was built on the site of two preexisting basilicas and its completion took more than five centuries. One of its bronze doors was not installed until 1965.

Because construction spanned centuries, the Duomo’s statues were carved by artists from different regions and periods, resulting in a monument that reads as a timeline of evolving artistic styles.

The Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo, which oversees the cathedral’s conservation, has sought funding to restore statues removed over the centuries for maintenance or safety reasons.

“Culture can save the world,” Andrea Gibelli, president of FNM, said during a news conference on Feb. 13 to mark the unveiling of Bearded Saint with Book. “We want to spread the cultural riches we are fortunate to have, which are often overlooked or not fully appreciated.”

A view of Milan’s Duomo cathedral at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

Other sculptures adopted under the program by different sponsors have included a 16th-century David, a depiction of Samson and the Lion, and a statue of Saint Matthew the Apostle.

While the number of adopted statues isn’t disclosed and not all are displayed in public spaces, Mantia said that her institution has preselected around 30 sculptures as eligible for restoration. Each case must be authorized by Italy’s cultural heritage authorities, as the process involves a formal loan agreement subject to conservation, insurance and transport regulations.

A view of Milan’s Duomo cathedral at the 2026 Winter Olympics, in Milan, Italy, Sunday, Feb. 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Antonio Calanni)

“We usually select them because they are very beautiful and not so damaged that they would be unsafe to loan,” Mantia said.

Once a donor reaches out, experts like Mantia accompany them to the Duomo’s storage facilities to choose a sculpture. After it is selected, restoration typically takes between one and three months.

Centuries-old marble

Bearded Saint with a Book was originally displayed outdoors. Aside from a black crust from air pollution on its surface, it had no structural damages preventing its loan.

Related Articles

A day after opening, Apostle Islands ice caves close (for now) for incoming storm

Vatican expands visitor experience at St. Peter’s Basilica to mark 400th anniversary

A sentimental journey to Scotland

Get into national parks free on Feb. 16 — but there’s a catch

Explore ‘Titanic’: New immersive experience puts you in a lifeboat for firsthand view of history

“This often involves only surface finishing or an intervention with compresses or mechanical cleaning,” Mantia said.

The marble used for both the statues and the Duomo itself comes from the quarries of Candoglia in Italy’s Piedmont region. The same stone has been used since the late 14th century, under the supervision of the Veneranda Fabbrica del Duomo.

“Beyond being the symbol of Milan, the Duomo is also a symbol of its history,” Mantia said. “It is a monument that grew together with the city, that tells within itself, in its statues and in the style with which it is decorated, the entire history of the city.”

Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP’s collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.