The NHL is certainly willing to experiment with its All-Star Game, and it appears to have hit a home run with its latest format. The 4 Nations Face-Off, partly intended to be a preview of the league’s best players competing in the 2026 Winter Olympics, has become something the league will probably stick with.
The championship game will take place Feb. 20, with the two round-robin winning nations, the United States and Canada, squaring off. The other two nations, Finland and Sweden, were eliminated.
The United States and Canada both went 2-1 in group play, but the United States did topple Canada, 3-1, when they met on Saturday.
That’s one of the few victories that the United States has over Canada in major international matchups, as this will be the nations’ fifth meeting in a gold medal or championship game in an NHL international tournament or the Olympics. The Canadians hold a 3-1 edge, winning at the 2010 Olympics, the 2022 Olympics and the 1991 Canada Cup. Meanwhile, the Americans’ lone victory came at the 1996 World Cup of Hockey, the event that replaced the Canada Cup.
This will be the ninth NHL international tournament (six Canada Cups and two World Cups of Hockey), and Canada has made the final in all nine. It sports a 6-2 record overall. As for the Americans, this is their third finals appearance, and they split the previous two.
On the ice, what many fans saw in the Saturday matchup was a microcosm of what they’ve seen from the teams during this tournament. Connor McDavid got Canada on the board first in the opening period, before Team USA then scored the game’s remaining three goals.
During this tournament, Canada has outscored opponents 6-1 in the first period as it simply suffocates foes as soon as the puck is dropped. The Canadians have not trailed at any point across three opening periods. The United States, however, has outscored its opponents 7-0 after the first period as the team has been great at making in-game adjustments. But the United States would certainly love to get off to a faster start Thursday as the Americans trailed in the first period in each of their three pool play contests.
Both teams have been perfect in killing penalties. The USA is 7 for 7, while Canada is 3 for 3. By comparison, Sweden, which placed third, and fourth-place Finland were both 4 for 6 in penalty kills.
Unsurprisingly, the tops of the statistical leaderboards favor the two finalists, with Canada’s Sidney Crosby and Team USA’s Zach Werenski tied for the most points in the tournament with five. Werenski leads all players with five assists, while three players share the top spot in goals with three: America’s Jake Guentzel, Canada’s Nathan MacKinnon, and Finland’s Mikael Granlund.
There will be a couple of personnel differences in Thursday’s final. Canada will have defenseman Cale Makar after the 2022 Norris Trophy winner missed Saturday due to illness. The United States will be missing Charlie McAvoy because of an upper-body injury. The Bruins defenseman won’t get to showcase his talents in front of the Boston crowd, robbing Team USA of a player who had the second-most hits (five) versus Canada in the earlier matchup.
Playing the game on American soil, at TD Garden in Boston, will certainly favor Team USA. The United States went into enemy territory on Saturday and picked up the win, beating Canada in Montreal. This will be the NHL’s first international tournament final to be played outside Canada, and the United States is hoping to send the fans home happy.
The puck will drop Thursday at 8 p.m. ET. The game will be broadcast by ESPN.
