BOSTON — The Americans said it was their time, but the Canadians reminded them it was their game.
An advertisement for Team Canada circulated back in Montreal,“Notre équipe. Notre sport,” which translates to “Our team. Our game.”
And the Canadians played to that mantra in a 3-2 overtime win over the United States to uphold their 15-year run as best-on-best champions by adding the first 4 Nations Face-Off trophy to an already-crowded cabinet.
The last of the four nations standing, thanks to OT hero and Player of the Game, Connor McDavid.
“I know, for myself personally, that’s going to be on my mind for the next year,” Brady Tkachuk said. “Back in Ottawa, it’s all about team success there. It’s hard when you’re playing here. It’s hard to think about in year’s time what we want to accomplish. I’ll always remember this feeling going into next year [at the Olympics].”
Team USA was looking to prove itself as a hockey powerhouse in this 4 Nations tournament, and the only team it could do it against was Canada.
Despite being the first team to secure its spot in the final with a 3-1 win over the Canadians in the round-robin, the United States was hindered by an ailing bench and stifled by an opposing goalie in Jordan Binnington on Thursday night.
Matthew Tkachuk didn’t take a single shift in the third period or overtime, as the Panthers star presumably labored with the same injury that kept him out of the final 12:36 of the first Canada game and against Sweden.
No one probably felt more at home than Binnington, who led the St. Louis Blues to a Stanley Cup-winning Game 7 victory inside TD Garden in 2019.
He came up with 31 saves, locking down with six in overtime, to help propel Canada to victory in a game compared to that very stage.
“I thought our team competed extremely hard all night long,” Team USA coach Mike Sullivan said. “It was a tremendous hockey game, fast paced. This is the fastest hockey I’ve ever been a part of, the whole tournament. Tonight was no different. You look at the overtime, we had three or four grade-A looks. We don’t score. They get an icing, and they score. I don’t know if we can dissect it any more than that. It was a pretty even hockey game, where both teams had momentum at different times. I thought it was an incredible display of hockey, on both sides. This is the very best of the best out there.”
As the winner of five of the previous six best-on-best international hockey tournaments, as well as nine of the 13 overall involving NHL players, going back to the 1976 Canada Cup, it should come as no surprise Canada prevailed.
It has won many times, won many gold medals and trophies, but something else was on the line for Canada on Thursday night.
As much as both sides said the political climate between the two nations had no influence on the matchup, Canadian fans watching at home were certainly pulling for their players to stick it to the country whose president, Donald Trump, has repeatedly threatened them with annexation.
The message was sent on the scoreboard.
What else would you expect from the first time McDavid, Sidney Crosby and Nathan MacKinnon joined forces?
The Americans still feel like they were right there, and it’s something they’ll hang on to as they prepare for a consistent schedule of international play.
“I’d say it’s a pretty even playing field, in my opinion,” USA captain Auston Matthews said of how close they came and how far they still have to go. “That could’ve gone either way, so …”
This was a moment the United States couldn’t seize, but it’s one Canada has delivered on so many times before.
Canada is hockey history, and this Canadian team captured the NHL’s 4 Nations Face-Off title to assert it’s still the best.
That is, until this time next year in Milan, where NHL players will make their grand return to the Olympic Winter Games.
For now, the hope is that American hockey players have taken notice of the noise this team was able to make the past 10 days.
“We’ve had a tough time with USA Hockey getting guys to play in the world championships, and I think guys that are at home watching this, I’m hoping they’re wanting a piece of it,” Dylan Larkin said. “They got to go to the world championships and prove themselves and play for their country. We’ve got to start winning that tournament, and I think that’s where Canada — those guys go and they play and that’s where it starts, pride for your country, pride for the flag and that crest going out for a game is just an unbelievable feeling.
“This grew the game really well, but I hope it pushes guys to want a piece of this and then the next generation that got to watch this, they’re going to watch the Olympics next year and hopefully there’s a different outcome from our country and that we feel we deserved.”