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Tessa Janecke Named to Team USA Roster for IIHF World Championship

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Fresh off a historic winter on the international stage, Penn State women’s ice hockey alumna Tessa Janecke is heading back to the global spotlight. USA Hockey announced Saturday afternoon that Janecke secured a spot on the 25-player roster for the upcoming IIHF Women’s World Championship, slated to run from November 6 to 16 in Herning, Denmark, as GoPSUSports.com reported.

Building a International Legacy in Red, White, and Blue

For Janecke, pulling on the Team USA sweater has quickly become standard operating procedure, but her resume keeps expanding. She enters this tournament having already skated in 56 games for the United States, racking up 20 goals and 26 assists for 46 total points. This trip to Denmark marks her fourth appearance at the IIHF Women’s World Championships.

Her previous world championship runs yielded gold medals in 2023 and 2025, highlighted by the championship-winning goal she netted during the 2025 tournament. Yet her most visible international breakthrough arrived earlier this year at the 2026 Milano Cortina Winter Olympics. Out in Italy, Janecke doled out five assists across seven games to help Team USA capture gold, cementing her status as the first Penn State athlete to earn a Winter Olympic gold medal. As Onward State noted, her extensive international ledger also includes four appearances in the Rivalry Series, two Collegiate Series showings, the 2024 Six Nations Tournament, and a silver medal at the 2022 IIHF U18 Women’s World Championship.

Leaving a Program Record in Happy Valley

Janecke earned her spot on the world championship roster by tearing through the collegiate record books. She closed out her career as Penn State’s all-time leading scorer across men’s and women’s hockey alike, putting up 201 points.

Her name sits at the top of several major offensive categories in Nittany Lions history:

  • Total points: 201
  • Goals: 89
  • Assists: 112
  • Multi-goal games: 17
  • Shots on goal: 776
  • Plus/minus rating: +112
  • Shorthanded goals: 9

That dominance translated into national hardware. Janecke became the first player in program history to earn First Team All-America honors during the 2025-26 season from USCHO and the AHCA, following Second Team nods in 2023-24 and 2024-25. She was also named a Top-Three Finalist for the Patty Kazmaier Memorial Award, crowning a collegiate run where she earned AHA Player of the Year and Forward of the Year honors for three consecutive seasons.

The Group Stage Schedule in Denmark

Team USA lands in Denmark looking to maintain its international momentum against top-tier European competition. Group A matches will test the Americans early:

Date Matchup Time (ET)
Friday, Nov. 6 USA vs. Switzerland 1 p.m.
Sunday, Nov. 8 USA vs. Germany 9 a.m.
Monday, Nov. 9 USA vs. Austria 1 p.m.
Wednesday, Nov. 11 USA vs. Czechia 1 p.m.

Survivors of the group matches advance directly into the knockout rounds, which kick off with the quarterfinals on November 13. The tournament culminates over the weekend, with the semifinals on November 15, followed by the bronze medal game at 9 a.m. ET and the gold medal game at 1 p.m. ET on Monday, November 16.

Janecke’s transition from collegiate record-breaker to seasoned international gold medalist happens in real time as the puck drops in Herning.

Tessa Janecke – Team USA Gold Medalist | Penn State Women's Hockey | IIHF Women's World Championship

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