There were no Christmas or birthday presents from Shelly and Kent Sanheim this year for their kids and grandkids. They combined everything into one big present for each family member.
But those tickets to Italy weren’t for a typical family vacation. Instead, the tickets for three of their kids and their families were bought early in the hope that their brother, Travis Sanheim, had done enough to book his own trip to the 2026 Milan Cortina Olympics and represent Canada.
The cancellation option, added just in case, was not needed.
Around 8 a.m. Mountain Time on the morning of New Year’s Eve, the Flyers defenseman called his parents to give them the news that they needed to work on their Italian. The phone rang as they were making their way through airport security, going from Vancouver, British Columbia, to Calgary, Alberta, as they followed the Flyers on their Western Canada trip.
“I guess maybe three, four years ago, he never thought he would have a shot at this, and now he’s going to, hopefully, bring back a gold, right?” Kent said. “So I don’t know what else to say. I guess, it’s just, I don’t know, it’s hard. It brings tears to my eyes.”
There was a lot of emotion as Kent and Shelly spoke to The Inquirer a few hours later on the concourse at the Scotiabank Saddledome, the rink where Travis starred for the Hitmen of the Western Hockey League during his junior career. The emotions filled the rink, as it was a family affair with everyone, including his twin brother, Taylor, his teammate in the WHL, there to watch Travis play for the Flyers and celebrate his big moment.
This is what the Sanheims are all about: family.
‘Where the Great Plains begin’
Driving through the prairies of Canada, the chartreuse of the canola fields can be mesmerizing as the sun hits the bright yellow that stretches across seemingly endless miles. Across that open land, not far from the 100th meridian and tucked into the town of Elkhorn, Manitoba, is one of those fields with some wheat intermixed. In this town of about 500 people, with no street light and one K-12 school, is where Travis Sanheim learned all about responsibility, work ethic, and dedication.
“Being out on a farm, you get firsthand … how much work my family puts in and being able to help out, at a young age, I remember skipping school for harvest, jumping in the combine, and helping mom and dad out with harvest … and just how excited I was to be able to help and be a part of it,” the 29-year-old defenseman said recently.
Born and raised a 3½-hour drive west of Winnipeg, Travis grew up wanting to be like Kent and would help him out on the farm as much as he could. He would help plant crops in the spring and harvest them in the fall and complete daily chores throughout the year. If he didn’t help, there would be no time for hockey. And for Travis, it was all about the hockey.
“Just a die-hard, loved the game — always has,” Shelly said of a young Travis. “Always excited to go to the rink and wanted to go to the rink.
“It’s funny, I see on Twitter or whatever about Trav being the last one off the ice and working on things, and I’m like, ‘This is this kid his entire life.’”
Elkhorn is where Travis fell in love with hockey. He always wanted to play, and he and Taylor even would try to scrape off the dugout, a storage reservoir on the farm, to go one-on-one. And while Kent would stay on the farm to work, they’d pile into the car and Shelly would drive them to the local community rink.
They never wanted to leave.
“As long as they didn’t look in the waiting room, they didn’t think they ever had to go home because I’d be knocking on the glass and pointing to my watch, and they just would never look up,” she said with a laugh.
“And then they got to stay longer at the rink. He would always be the last one on the ice, if possible. We dragged him off.”
Wheat Kings and hockey things
At some point growing up, Travis got a key to the rink, which often was open, anyway, in the town that sits near Manitoba’s border with Saskatchewan. While the temperatures could dip well into the teens in the winter months, he’d call his buddies to get games of shinny going with him and his brother.
“We did everything together,” Travis said of Taylor. “A lot of battles in the basement, playing hockey against each other. That’s kind of where my competitiveness, I would say, came from. … Was really lucky to have the opportunities that I did growing up, that I was able to skate as much as I was, and had the guys that pushed me, and obviously, my brother was a huge reason as to why.”
The duo also would hit a frozen pond on Boxing Day before watching Canada compete at World Juniors — a fitting tradition for a family that has a sign in the living room asking people not to disturb them because they’re watching hockey. And Travis remembers sitting in front of the television as Sidney Crosby crushed the hearts of Americans everywhere with his golden goal against the U.S. at the 2010 Vancouver Olympics.
As a 13-year-old, he just wanted to make the NHL; he never expected to now be lining up alongside the all-time great seeking a gold medal.
“Super excited,” he said. “Obviously, a dream come true. Getting to represent your country and playing in the Olympics and being an Olympian means a lot, and something that I never really thought was possible, but now that it’s here, and then I get the chance to do it, just really excited.”
Sanheim has donned the maple leaf several times before, including at the 2013 World Under-17 Hockey Challenge and the 2014 U18 World Championship, snagging a bronze medal at the latter; the 2016 World Juniors; and the 2022 and 2025 World Championships, winning silver four years ago.
And he surprised many across Canada last year when he was named to the team for the 4 Nations Face-Off tournament, which the Canadians won. Now he’s going for Olympic gold.
“You never know, there’s so many good players in Canada. They could take a second team and probably still medal with the second team,” Shelly said. “So, you know, just the fact that he was in the mix was a thrill for us, and then to have the dream come true here just — I think I’m still shell-shocked over it. It’s hard to believe.”
‘Across the icy world’
Tampa Bay Lightning and Team Canada coach Jon Cooper isn’t one to show his hand. However, the way he spoke of Sanheim in November in the bowels of the Lightning’s Benchmark International Arena — with a Cheshire Cat-like grin on his face — there was no denying that the defenseman was on his short list.
“You see these players, you compete against these players, but you don’t really know till you have them,” Cooper said. “And I’ve always, I’ve really liked his game. I’m a big fan of big [defensemen] that take up a lot of space and can skate, and he can do all those things. But his ability to jump into plays, he’s got an offensive mind to him.”
Sanheim has come a long way from being a little nervous and wide-eyed at Hockey Canada’s first practice in Brossard, Quebec, ahead of the 4 Nations Face-Off last February. And while he didn’t start the tournament in the lineup, by the end — half because of injury and half because of his performance with the versatility to play right and left defense — he was not just skating in the championship game, but Cooper had him out there for the first shift of overtime.
“He was good. … Travis got thrown in when one of the guys, when [Shea Theodore] got hurt, probably,” said Vegas Golden Knights coach Bruce Cassidy, an assistant on Cooper’s staff.
“Real good player, steady player, liked his pace, transported pucks, got involved. … I think both [he and Thomas Harley] ended up playing a little bit on the right side, and there was no hesitancy to get up the ice and join the rush. And I think that’s the type of team Coop wanted to build, so he fit right in.”
There will be comfort now for Sanheim, having skated on the same team as some of the game’s biggest names like Crosby, Connor McDavid, Cale Makar, and Nathan MacKinnon. And he’ll surely be comfortable because he’ll be able to look up whenever he wants to see his family in the stands in Milan, Italy.
And he’ll surely be thinking about how far he’s come from his days on a farm in Elkhorn, Manitoba, a place Shelly says “gives him some time for clearing his head and stuff.” He hasn’t been able to spend too much time there with all his hockey adventures, but it circles back to the biggest question heading into the Games, which for Sanheim will begin Thursday against Flyers teammate Dan Vladař and Czechia (10:40 a.m., USA and Peacock).
When we spoke to Kent on the Flyers fathers’ trip in 2023, he revealed that “if he can’t make the playoffs, you better get home to help me work.”
So how about now that his son is heading to the Olympics to represent his town, his province, and Canada?
“I cut him a little slack now,” Kent said with a chuckle, “but we’ll take his help if he’s coming.”
