Canada expecting a difficult challenge at 4 Nations Face-Off – but they’re looking forward to it
It’s been a long time since NHLers last played in a best-on-best international tournament – nearly nine years, to be exact.
The star power across the league has changed so much in that span, with many of the NHL’s top stars having very limited big-game international experience. With the 4 Nations Face-Off kicking off in Montreal on Wednesday, many of Canada’s top players are looking forward to the challenge.
“It hasn’t happened for a long time, so it’s great to have it back,” Mitch Marner said during a media scrum on Monday afternoon. ‘Everyone’s excited about it. We’ll try to get our feet on it as quick as we can, get stuff going here and try to figure out what our game plan is going for.”
Canada, along with the four other teams, practiced for the first time ahead of the tournament in Brossard, Quebec on Monday. Canada and Sweden will kick the tournament off on Wednesday at 8:00 PM ET, with Finland and USA battling it out on Thursday.
For Canada, they’re looking to repeat as champions like they did at the past three best-on-best tournaments: the 2010 and 2014 Olympic Winter Games, and the 2016 World Cup of Hockey.
“The depth of our team, I feel like it’s built really well,” Cale Makar said. “I think every line has a different personality in essence and different character guys that are gonna play different roles. For us, I think (management) built a really solid team. You need depth to win and that’s what we brought here at least.”
It won’t be easy, though. Many have the United States pegged as tournament favorites after announcing one of the most dangerous lineups the team has ever assembled at an international event.
“There’s four really, really high-end teams,” Connor McDavid said. “Anybody can really win it. Obviously, we feel good about our group, but it’s gonna be about who can peak at the right time. It’s a quick tournament. You got to come together quick. And we’re hoping to do that.”
Canada will have just three players returning from the World Cup of Hockey nine years ago – forwards Sidney Crosby and Brad Marchand, as well as defenseman Drew Doughty, who was named as Alex Pietrangelo’s replacement in recent days.
“All the teams are very good,” Doughty said. “I think every team is getting better, and Canada’s getting better. It’s gonna be a hard-fought tournament. The puck drops already in two days, and you have no choice but to be ready and just start flying right off the bat. We expect to be a hard team to play against, and I know we’ll be that way.”
As for what will make Canada a title threat?
“This team has a lot of firepower. Definitely have a lot more speed than we’ve had in the past,” Doughty said. “All the kids are just faster these days. Really like the looks of our team. We didn’t just go and take the top goal scorers. We took a real team. I think that’ll be an advantage for us.”
While it’s only a four-team tournament – and likely a one-off – players aren’t taking the opportunity for granted. Having an all-star-caliber tournament with the best hockey players in the world has been hard to come by. And while it’s missing out on some top nations, the participating players are still looking forward to it.
“At an All-Star game, it’s more for enjoyable and fun and stuff like that. I don’t think this will be kind of that on the ice in a way,” Marner added. “It’s gonna be more competitive and guys are gonna want to win. That’ll be the difference.”