Why is Laila Edwards, one of the top young forwards in the world, playing defense?

New York Times

16-04-2025

ČESKÉ BUDĚJOVICE, Czechia – For most of the third period on Sunday night against Canada, Laila Edwards sat on the bench watching her U.S. teammates close out a 2-1 preliminary-round victory.
The last time she played Canada at a Women's World Championship, she was a third-line winger and scored one of five U.S. goals in a heated gold medal match, which Canada won in overtime. After the game, Edwards was named tournament MVP at only 20 years old, the youngest player to ever win the award.
This time around, she was stapled to the bench after a defensive gaffe led to a Laura Stacey breakaway goal, while playing defense for only the third time at a major international competition.
Laura Stacey scores a beauty on the breakaway! 🚨
Canada cuts the U.S. lead in half!#WomensWorlds pic.twitter.com/bzzIpfNc6v
— TSN (@TSN_Sports) April 13, 2025
It's understandable, of course, to roll with a more veteran defense corps in a one-goal game against your bitter rivals. But more than anything, the moment — both the defensive error and the subsequent benching — begged the question: Why is one of the top young forwards in the world playing defense?
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The 21-year-old first made headlines when she became the first Black woman to play for the U.S. senior women's national team in November 2023. At worlds in Utica, N.Y., last year, she scored a tournament-leading six goals in seven games. This season, as a junior at the top-ranked University of Wisconsin, Edwards led the NCAA in scoring and was a top-three finalist for the Patty Kazmaier Award, given to the best women's hockey player in college hockey.
All of her early-career accomplishments — and there are plenty, such as winning MVP at U18 women's worlds in 2022 and winning two NCAA championships in three years — have come while playing the forward position.
And yet Edwards is in Czechia, on just her second senior world championship team, playing an entirely different position.
The move to defense was a 'mutual decision' between U.S. management and Edwards, she said. The idea sprung from the influx of American forward talent and Edwards' desire to do whatever it takes to play for her country.
'This is the No. 1 thing that I want, to be on this team,' Edwards told The Athletic. 'Whether that means I'm forward, D or even goalie, I'm all in.'
Last summer, Edwards played defense at the Bob Suter Memorial Classic, a charity hockey tournament in Wisconsin, and enjoyed it, telling a member of the U.S. staff about her experience. 'I just knew the forward group for USA was so competitive,' Edwards explained.
So competitive, in fact, that Edwards was told she would actually have a better chance at staying on the roster at defense than forward. Given the choice of switching positions, or potentially being on the outside looking in with the 2026 Milan Olympics approaching, Edwards chose the former.
Initially, head coach John Wroblewski said, he was not on board with the idea.
'We just got done with you making the team, and you had six goals as a forward and were named most valuable forward in the tournament,' Wroblewski thought at the time. 'What are we thinking?'
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But when the U.S. brain trust started doing the math on which forwards to invite to their November Rivalry Series games against Canada, they realized moving Edwards to defense made the roster calculus work.
'We had five lines of players that we wanted to bring to Rivalry, except it was five lines plus one,' Wroblewski said. 'If Laila was a forward, we had 16 forwards that we wanted to bring.
'So then you start going, OK, well, if we want to take a look at Player X and Player Y and Player Z, and if Laila wants to play defense … It opens up a spot for somebody else to come in.'
Beyond that, after losing to Canada last year at worlds in Utica, one of Wroblewski's takeaways was that Team USA needed to show up in Czechia with 'the biggest, sturdiest and most mobile team' possible to negate how good Canada is. So the U.S. roster, particularly at forward, has a focus on veteran, two-way talent more than just young, high-end skill. Star forward Kirsten Simms, 20, has played a smaller role on the team than expected, with veterans such as Kelly Pannek and Hayley Scamurra getting more regular ice time.
KIRSTEN SIMMS TIES UP THE NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP GAME WITH 18.9 SECONDS REMAINING 😱
OVERTIME ON ESPNU NOW 🍿 pic.twitter.com/jwxx3Lx4Et
— ESPN (@espn) March 23, 2025
Ultimately, moving Edwards to the blue line allows Team USA to lean on a veteran-heavy forward group but keep one of its top young players in the mix — even if she's out of position.
'It gets us the 20 best skaters on the ice,' Wroblewski said.
Still, at Wisconsin, Edwards remained a forward this season, save for a handful of shifts on the blue line when the Badgers were blowing out opponents. And when she ultimately reported to the national team for the Rivalry Series in November, Edwards was on the blue line.
On Nov. 6, she made her debut as a U.S. defender against Team Canada, which has won four of the last five major international tournaments, including the 2022 Olympics. Despite not quite being eased into the transition, she had a multi-point game in a 7-2 win.
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'That was crazy,' Edwards said. 'But it was fine, everyone was really helpful with the adjustment.'
As expected, the move also allowed U.S. management to give a few new (and returning) forwards like Casey O'Brien, Gabbie Hughes and Grace Zumwinkle a look on the roster. Only Zumwinkle, the 2024 PWHL rookie of the year, made the worlds team from that group.
After those three games in November, Edwards returned to Wisconsin to once again play her natural position. She finished the NCAA season with 35 goals in 41 games, including a hat trick in the national semifinals to make her third straight championship game, where she scored a goal in a wild 4-3 Wisconsin overtime win.
Two weeks later, she was back on Team USA. And she was back on the blue line, paired with No. 1 defender Megan Keller, and sometimes taking shifts with Stecklein, one of the very best shutdown defenders in the women's game.
'It's really incredible,' Stecklein said about Edwards' job change. 'I don't know how she does it. But she's done it just so eagerly. She will accept any role, do whatever is asked of her. And I think is doing a really good job at it, like the patience and composure she has, especially at such a young age, it's really incredible.'
Edwards appears to have the skills to be an effective defender. At 6-foot-1, she has incredible reach and innate ability to break up plays. As a forward, she was already strong on the forecheck and at hunting pucks. Her vision is excellent and her passing is accurate, which could help her break pucks out of the defensive zone and make her an excellent power-play quarterback.
The adjustment is still a work in progress, though, and Edwards said she has 'a lot to work on.'
'It's a lot different back there,' she said. 'I need to be a little quicker on plays and a little harder on plays. I'm the last one back, so I gotta be a little smarter than I've been. These are things that I'm learning, and I hope to get better at.'
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Through four games, Edwards has just one assist, and admits she's been a little too hesitant offensively. Last week against Czechia, Edwards passed on a few scoring chances in the slot she probably would have buried last year with her heavy and accurate shot. U.S. star Hilary Knight has said Edwards' shot is so hard it looks like she's about to rip the net apart.
'I think I've been trying to be so careful of not being overly offensive, that I'm giving up a bit of my offensive talent,' Edwards said. 'I don't think it has to be that way, but I think that comes with experience. So the more I get comfortable, and the more I play, I think those pieces will tie together.'
On Tuesday night against Switzerland, Edwards played over 19 minutes, second among U.S. defenders, and looked better on the blue line than she did against Canada, breaking the puck out of the zone and making plays from the offensive blue line.
'The pieces are all there for her to be an unbelievable defender,' Wroblewski said, while later adding that Edwards will be given a runway for this change.
Still, it's hard to overlook Edwards' bona fides as a forward. No player scored more goals in the NCAA last season – including five current national team forwards in Abbey Murphy, Lacey Eden, Tessa Janecke, Joy Dunne and Kirsten Simms. Only six-time world champion Alex Carpenter scored as many as Edwards' six goals at last year's world championships.
With a combination of size and skill, Edwards is one of the most unique and exciting prospects in the game. In 2023, Wroblewski even said, 'I don't think there's another woman like her in the game right now.'
Everything about Edwards suggests that she is, at the very least, one of the top 14 forwards in the United States. Five years from now, by the 2030 Olympics, she could be the face of the program.
But for now, she's trying to learn a new position on the fly, with another potential gold medal against Canada looming in the next four days.