The Athletic Hockey Show - Brady Tkachuk talks Olympics, Canada rivalry, and going for gold

Episode Date: January 25, 2026

In this exclusive interview, just a couple weeks away from the Milano Cortina Olympics, The Athletic’s NHL insider Pierre LeBrun talks with Ottawa Senators captain Brady Tkachuk about donning the Team USA sweater and representing his country on the world stage, the 4 Nations tournament, and the US-Canada rivalry, as a prelude to the Winter Games, and what winning a gold medal alongside his brother, Matthew, would mean to him.Watch The Athletic Show every Saturday on Amazon Fire TV and every Sunday on YouTube. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey everyone, this is Max Pullman from The Athletic Hockey Show, and today we're bringing you an exclusive interview with Ottawa Senator's captain Brady Kachuk. My colleague Pierre LeBrun did the interview for The Athletic Show, the Athletics Weekly Sports Show airing Saturdays on Amazon Fire, and available the next day on YouTube. You can check out our show notes below for more info. Brady's heading to Milan in a couple weeks to play for Team USA, and if we learned anything from the Four Nations,

Kachuk is going to be right in the middle of it all. I'll be back with Laz on Monday, but for now here is Pierre LeBron and Brady Kachuk. Hope you enjoy it. All right, Brady Kachuk, Olympic Games, right around the corner. You've been thinking about this for years, but now that it's actually here, have you thought about what it's going to be like

to put on the Team USA sweater and go out in that ice in Milan? Being able to say that you're an Olympian and all that kind of hard work as a kid paying an opportunity representing the USA and to do it on the biggest stage of them all, it's, I can't believe it's right around the corner and something that will be a dream come true. Well, you said we, and I know you mean the whole team,

but you'll be playing alongside your brother, Matthew. And listen, I think most kids who grew up in North America dream first of winning a Stanley Cup. But how many conversations have you had growing up with Matthew with the idea of playing together for Team USA in Olympic Games? I wouldn't say it was much of a conversation. I mean, I think it just was a dream growing up.

You're trying to score the game winner for the Stanley Cup. But that narrative for the game-winning goal goes from Game 7 Stanley Cup to, you know, that O-T winner in the gold medal games. Those goals you score in the driveway and the mini-sticks, it's for an event like, you know, gold medal Olympics. Salt Lake City, your dad won a silver medal there in 2002. Have you held the medal? Have you seen the medal?

Do you know where it is? I don't know where it is now, but I remember I had a show and tell in second grade, and like, I don't know why it came to my head, but I brought in my dad's silver medal from Salt Lake city to show until all my class and be like this is something my dad won. Now it makes sense because I think right after show until my mom was there and I immediately handed it to her and then she left because she didn't trust me to have it all day. I'd be aware it at recess and all the kids being excited but me not really realizing the significance of it. Hopefully we can add a little more platinum to that too. Well you got a taste of it at four nations. I mean you got Finland, Sweden, the US and

Canada, all the best NHL players, overtime, championship game. What do you take away from Four Nations, knowing what you guys almost achieved and that you're right there? Well, for us, it's just being one goal away. And overtime, especially in like a game seven environment that, you know, anything can happen. And, you know, we talked about it after. Sometimes you need to face, you know, some hard time, some adversity to, you know,

make our goals even sweeter and even greater. So as much as that sucked, I think there's a lot of, learning lessons. I know that we'll use to be better in the Olympics. Now you also play Team Canada a week before that championship game at Four Nations and around Robin game at the Bell Seder in Montreal. Walk me through those opening nine seconds of the opening face-off, which became such a huge story and I think brought in an audience to hockey that hadn't been there before. Walk me through the game plan because I know after the game you told us that you and Matthew had kind of scripted something like that.

I was more nervous for Matthew's fight than my fight. We just kind of joked around about it. We're public enemy number one, and we felt that even the days leading up to it, that our whole team was going to be hated right when we walked that building and wasn't going to be any support, and that all we had was each other. We wanted to show everybody how much of a team that we were

and how we were going to do whatever it takes, and we were going to just show how much that we care about our team or country, and that we were going to find a way to flip the table on them. So we had both our wives there, and I don't even think they knew either. So they're like what just happened. But my mom was just sitting there just ready to enjoy it. And she was like as flustered as it gets after. Can you explain the rivalry between Team USA and Team Canada right now

to someone maybe just dropping in? And what is it like to be in the middle of that rivalry, especially after Four Nations? Well, I think for the people that don't know, it's a rivalry that's always been there at every level. It could be youth hockey. It can be, you know, for any other. NHL players. It's, you know, Canada's been the top dog for so many years. And now that the

U.S. is knocking on the door, we want to, you know, take out the top dog in the hockey world. Well, it's funny you say that because I was chatting with John Cooper, the head coach in team Canada recently, and he said, we have to be careful that the tournament's not all about when we play Team USA. We don't even know if we're going to play them. There are a lot of good countries. And I'm wondering just from playing Finland and Sweden, this is not just about U.S. and Canada, right? I mean, you've got to be ready for anything there in Milan. There's so many great players playing in this tournament and playing in the Olympics that there's no guarantee that you'll make it to the gold medal game.

It's not a shoe in that, oh, US, Canada, there's so many great players, so many great countries that every day is so important and every day is a game seven. Milan will be the first Olympics with NHL players in 12 years since Sochi or Russia in 2014. There have been a lot of NHL stars have been outspoken in the process to this to get back to the Olympics. I mean, how worried were you at some point that may never happen for your generation? More feel bad for the guys that have had amazing careers within the 12 years and have had a chance to represent their country in the Olympics.

And it's a no-brainer that everybody wants to be in the Olympics. Everybody wants to be an Olympian. And I'm just happy that it was no greed upon that. It'd be great for not just the players, but it'd be great for the league and great for the growing of the game where we want to be there. We should be there. and I think you always look back to when you're kids, you want to win two things. You want to win the Stanley Cup and the gold medal,

and I think every NHL player should have that opportunity and a chance to be able to win that every four years. Miracle on ice, obviously one of the greatest American sporting moments ever, maybe the greatest, 1980, beating a juggernaut Soviet team, a bunch of college kids. It has impacted sports in many ways, but I'm wondering how many times you watched the movie, not to be too corny about it. What do you take from it?

I don't even think I could give you a number the amount of times I've watched. That was a staple growing up. It was great to have Mike Rizzioni on the podcast and just getting his take of, like, the little stories behind the scenes. Of course, as big as that Soviet game was, they still need to win the next one against Finland. And in the movie, it doesn't show the Finland game as much, because obviously the Soviet game was huge. But I thought it was really cool that the hardest, practice that they've ever had was the day after the Soviet game. Herbrooks said that, now, they'd take it to the grades if they didn't win that game. So they're able to still get the job done and, you know, the rest is history. Part of the backdrop, of course, in 1980 as well,

is that still the Cold War, right? And the political tension around that moment in that game where the sport transcends in many ways. I mean, listen, you lived some of that political backdrop in 2025 at Four Nations, a booing of the U.S. anthem at the Bell Center in Montreal, a politically charged tournament, as it turns out, which I don't think players on Team USA or Team Canada really wanted, but it was there. So what's your sense of representing Team USA in Italy,

again, with some of the political backdrop of it, and how do you want to represent Team USA? Well, I think I'm one of a few guys on the team are in a difficult spot when it comes to that, being captains of, you know, Canadian teams. You got to almost be a little more cautious and careful and the environment and that stuff. But at the end of the day, there's a lot of that stuff

you can't control. A lot of people have Team USA co-favorites with Team Canada. Some people have Canada with a slight edge. What's it like in your mind when you think about 1980? The pressure but the privilege for you guys to be able to accomplish that in Milan. For us, we're probably going to go in there with an underdog mindset, but expect a lot out of ourselves.

So I think pressure is a privilege. It's just an honor to be on the team and just be a part of that group and hopefully I have a chance to achieve a childhood dream. Have you allowed yourself to envision standing on a podium and having an Olympic gold medal put around your neck? Oh yeah, I mean, I'm definitely not gonna shy away. It's fun to picture that and visualize that

and being up there with my brother. Like, of course, I've visualized that. I've dreamt to that moment and now, I'm just gonna do everything in our power. as a team to have it come to fruition.