Breaking down USA’s 4 Nations Face-Off roster

Credit: BUFFALO, N.Y. - Team USA defenceman Adam Fox (#8) prepares to shoot the puck during a game between Finland and USA at the 2018 IIHF World Junior Championship at KeyBank Center on December 31, 2017 in Buffalo, New York. (Photo from Anders Marshall/Euro Hockey)

Finally, endless projection and speculation gives way to reality. All four entrants released their finalized 4 Nations Face-Off rosters on Wednesday, filling out the remainders of their teams after naming six players apiece in June.

How does each roster look? What did the management groups get right and wrong? You can find breakdowns for Canada, Finland and Sweden here. Now, let’s dive into Team USA:

FORWARDS (13)

Matt Boldy (MIN)
Kyle Connor (WPG)
Jack Eichel (VGK)
Jake Guentzel (TBL)
Jack Hughes (NJD)
Chris Kreider (NYR)
Dylan Larkin (DET)
Auston Matthews (TOR)
J.T. Miller (VAN)
Brock Nelson (NYI)
Brady Tkachuk (OTT)
Matthew Tkachuk (FLA)
Vincent Trocheck (NYR)

DEFENSEMEN (7)

Brock Faber (MIN)
Adam Fox (NYR)
Noah Hanifin (VGK)
Quinn Hughes (VAN)|
Charlie McAvoy (BOS)
Jaccob Slavin (CAR)
Zach Werenski (CBJ)

GOALTENDERS (3)

Connor Hellebuyck (WPG)
Jake Oettinger (DAL)
Jeremy Swayman (BOS)

This is the best American roster ever submitted for best-on-best play, with all due respect to the generation-defining 1996 World Cup of Hockey squad or the two Olympic silver medalists in 2002 and 2010. The red, white and blue are loaded with the best goal scorer of his generation in Auston Matthews, the reigning Norris Trophy winner in Quinn Hughes, the NHL’s most effective pest in Matthew Tkachuk, as well as the best goaltending trio assembled by any one country since Canada at the 1998 Olympics – which featured Patrick Roy, Martin Brodeur and Curtis Joseph.

Pretty good, right? The absolute strength of this entry is in net. Hellebuyck is at the top of his game and he’s surrounded by two very capable mates in Oettinger and Swayman, who not coincidentally share identical contracts after Swayman helped set the market last summer. Here’s the thing: Team USA can’t rely solely on goaltending, because that vaunted group of Canadian backstoppers finished fourth in Nagano.

Luckily for the Americans, they shouldn’t have to hope and pray that their goaltending bails them out. This team should fly up and down the ice, set with both gifted skaters and proficient puck movers. It will be a family affair in Montreal and Boston with two sets of brothers (Hughes and Tkachuk) dotting the roster, as well as Mike Sullivan coaching his son-in-law in Charlie McAvoy. And while all five of those selections were obvious and predictable, that isn’t to say there weren’t difficult decisions made. It had to be tough leaving out goal scorers such as Cole Caufield, Brock Boeser and Tage Thompson, playmaker extraordinaire Clayton Keller, reliable stalwart John Carlson, young stud defenders Jake Sanderson and Alex Vlasic, as well as injured netminder Thatcher Demko.

It’s likely that the biggest criticism Team USA faces will be in the goals left on the table without the productivity from Caufield, Boeser, Thompson and Keller. That is fair, and that commentary can be reserved up to and including after the tournament. But when you look at it from management’s perspective, selecting more size, grit and experience, you can understand how they arrived at their roster submission. Chris Kreider is one of the best net-front players in the game; Vincent Trocheck is really well-rounded. They’ve both played in big games in their careers. This isn’t a simple as selecting an All-Star team. The biggest thing that Team USA kept asking throughout the selection process: If you’re not contributing to the power play, how are you helping us win? There really isn’t much to pick at here. This is a roster fully capable of going toe-to-toe with Team Canada.

Biggest Reach

Selecting Brock Nelson over Tage Thompson. There aren’t many statistical categories in which Nelson earns the check mark in comparison. Despite playing 15 fewer games than Nelson over the last three-plus seasons, Thompson has more goals (10), more assists (8), that means 18 more points. Thompson is definitely the high-end scorer, as his career best is 47 goals, while Nelson’s is 37. They both have the optionality to play center or wing, though Thompson is two inches bigger with a massive 6-foot-6 frame. I’d want to put that engine to use. But Nelson is clearly the more defensively responsible player, and he’s much better in the face-off dot, which is perhaps why Team USA decided to go in his direction at the bottom of the lineup.

Biggest Omission

It’s fair to say that Jason Robertson played his way off of Team USA. Even with a disappointing season unfolding with just five goals and nine assists for 14 points in 24 games, it’s still a real surprise to see Robertson didn’t make the cut. Since his breakout season in 2021-22, Robertson ranks fifth in goals (121), fourth in points (282), third in even-strength points (189) and fourth in game-winning goals (22) among American-born players over that three-plus season span. Robertson has helped the Stars to back-to-back Western Conference Final runs, so he has big-game experience. He’s also north of a point-per-game player in 316 career games. Put another way: Team USA cut a 46-goal and 109-point NHL scorer. If that doesn’t speak to how far USA Hockey has come over the last decade since our previous best-on-best competition, nothing will.

Burning question

Is the American blueline big enough to defend against a vaunted Canadian attack?

That’s really the one thing that stands out about Team USA. It’s not that their defense isn’t good, or will struggle. It’s just that we know that size makes a difference in the Stanley Cup playoffs – and this tournament is the playoffs on steroids. It may be a little higher-skilled, a little less of a grind, but the average height of the American blueline checks in at 6-foot-1. Two of their projected top four defensemen are under six foot. And Slavin and Hanifin are the two tallest at 6-foot-3. Size isn’t everything, but the blueprint of the USA back end is a definite departure from the way the game has been trending the last few years, and they’ll have to hope that their high-end puck movement will be the antidote to trouble in their own end.

Projected Lines

Miller-Matthews-M. Tkachuk
Connor-Eichel-B. Tkachuk
Larkin-Hughes-Boldy
Kreider-Trocheck-Guentzel
Nelson

Hughes-McAvoy
Slavin-Fox
Werenski-Faber
Hanifin

Hellebuyck
Oettinger
Swayman
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