MONTREAL — Rare is it that you will find a hockey game so big that it almost feels bigger than hockey.
Rarer still is the set of circumstances that required the best players in the world to wait nearly a decade while a pandemic and a never-ending series of logistical hurdles prevented them from pulling on their national team sweaters in a best-on-best environment.
And so on a snowy Saturday night, in the bubbling cauldron of the Bell Centre, we will finally witness a collision of what was and what may now be. The wait is mercilessly over. Canada vs. USA, the sport’s established power vs. its ascendant power, coming together to begin writing the next chapter of the story at the 4 Nations Face-Off.
“It’s a hockey game that you love to be a part of no matter what experience you’ve had in the past,” said Sidney Crosby.
Both teams opened this event with a victory and are considered co-favorites to ultimately win it, but the tournament format comes with no guarantees they’ll even meet again in next week’s final at TD Garden in Boston.
All they have for sure is a Saturday meeting that’s been circled on calendars for months. However, the stew of anticipation has actually been boiling slowly for years while top American and Canadian players found no outlet to stoke a rivalry that burns white hot at the world under-18 championship and world junior tournament, only to be abandoned once they reached the NHL.
Consider that only Crosby and teammate Drew Doughty were on the ice when these countries last met in a men’s best-on-best for the semifinals at the 2014 Sochi Olympics. For the other 44 rostered players at this event, this is something brand new.
And the specter of history hangs over everything.
“I’m just in awe of what Canada and USA games used to be like in best on best,” American forward Matthew Tkachuk told The Athletic recently. “For us to be able to play in that now, I’m just super excited. That U.S.-Canada rivalry is so big. It doesn’t get much better than playing them on a Saturday night in Montreal.
“It’s going to be amazing.”
Here’s a reminder of how quickly time flies: The last major victory in men’s hockey by the U.S. came with Keith Tkachuk — Matthew and Brady’s father — playing for the 1996 World Cup team that knocked off Canada in the three-game final. And on Thursday night, Keith was helping lift his grandson’s baby carriage through the snowbanks left behind by a massive storm on the way to the rink before watching his boys score two goals apiece during a 6-1 win over Finland.
Three of the four goals came after the Tkachuk brothers were united on a line with center Jack Eichel, and that will factor heavily into the Canadian game plan. Big, physical, skilled and unafraid to crash the crease, they are a massive load for any opponent to handle.
USA Goals: 6
Tkachuk Goals: 4😱😱😱😱 pic.twitter.com/AtgpAxWlfq
— ESPN (@espn) February 14, 2025
It’s notable that the only non-injury-related change to Canada’s lineup following a 4-3 overtime win over Sweden in Wednesday’s tournament opener will be dressing tenacious center Sam Bennett. He’ll play between Brad Marchand and Seth Jarvis on a trio not designed as a Tkachuk antidote, per se, but one that will look to inflict a physical toll of its own.
Yes, even in a matchup featuring Eichel, Auston Matthews, Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Sidney Crosby and a host of other top-billing superstars, everyone on both sides seemed to be expecting a battle measured more by grit and will rather than pure skill.
“It’s going to be an emotional game,” said American forward Dylan Larkin.
“You’re going to get a high-intensity, highly physical, great effort, kind of in-your-face game,” said Canadian coach Jon Cooper. “I can’t imagine it being anything else.”
These countries, and these players, have certainly been through it in other venues and other competitions. Ten of the last 13 gold medals handed out at the World Junior Championship have been claimed by either Canada or the U.S., with the American victories in 2017 and 2021 coming over the Canadians in the final.
But as great as that tournament is, it’s not the same as what we have here. When asked about his memories of beating Canada a couple of times as a teenager, Matthew Tkachuk said: “I don’t think they had Connor McDavid and Nathan MacKinnon and Sidney Crosby on those teams.”
Indeed, this is the truest measuring stick of global hockey supremacy we’ll get before the start of next February’s Olympic tournament in Milan.
That this Canada-USA game will be played in a city that arguably appreciates the sport unlike any other only adds to the occasion. Larkin was part of the American team that lost a world junior game to Canada at the Bell Centre on New Year’s Eve 2015 and predicted that Saturday’s atmosphere could rival a Stanley Cup Final.
“It’s a great building, great atmosphere always,” he said. “In Montreal, when you play against the Canadiens, it feels like it’s the most important thing in the world when you’re playing that night, and they have loyal fans, and they’re lucky with a great hockey building.
“But I expect it to be 10 notches higher from your normal Tuesday night here against the Canadiens.”
Tensions have been ratcheted up with U.S. President Donald Trump repeatedly musing about turning Canada into the 51st state since taking office last month and recently imposing a 25 percent tariff on Canadian goods, before later issuing a 30-day reprieve.
Some fans booed the “Star-Spangled Banner” before Thursday’s game — there’s real concern the reaction could be much louder and much more pronounced on Saturday — which drew criticism from even some of the Canadian players.
“They can boo all they want during the games, but the anthems, those should be off limits,” said Marchand. “Those are moments to show respect for the veterans and the millions and millions of people that sacrificed our life so that we can continue our freedom and we have the luxury to play a game like this. They should not be booing the Americans during that anthem. They have nothing to do with the political things that are going on.
“I do feel bad for those guys in that moment. I don’t think it’s right.”
Doughty was also disappointed by the anthem booing but said he understands the source of the frustration. The on-ice rivalry with the Americans is something he feels deeply even after spending his entire adult life in Los Angeles. The 35-year-old traces those feelings back to his youth, when he’d come up against American teams at tournaments and “you’d want to beat them so bad.”
He certainly doesn’t expect the U.S. to be discouraged or intimated by the hostile reception they’re likely to face again on Saturday.
“They want to be the villains,” said Doughty. “They want to beat us. I’m sure all of this stuff is making them more hungry. But at the same time, we’ve got stuff going on too that’s making us hungry.
“Both teams are going to be starving out there.”
The entire hockey world has been starved for this kind of competition since the 2016 World Cup, which has only raised the stakes and sense of anticipation here. It has been too long since we all saw top-level Sweden-Finland and USA-Canada matchups and now we’ll get both on the same day.
Deep down, the U.S. players know they’ve got a chance to claim the throne of hockey supremacy with the international calendar kicking back into high gear in the coming years — although that’s not what is driving them most now.
“It’s not so much changing the way hockey is looked at, we just want to play as best as we can and we want to win,” said Matthew Tkachuk. “We want to be known as the best, and to do that you’re going to have to beat the best.”
After years and years of waiting, and with a hockey-obsessed country squarely rooting against them, here they find themselves with their shot.
(Top photos of Matthew Tkachuk and Sidney Crosby: Minas Panagiotakis / Getty Images and David Kirouac / Imagn Images)
