The Current - Canada beats U.S. as patriotism hits the ice

Episode Date: February 21, 2025

Canada beat the U.S. in overtime in the 4 Nations Face-Off final on Thursday, against a backdrop of tensions and threats about annexing Canada. Canadian sports columnist Bruce Arthur and American sports writer Greg Wyshynski talk about a game that brought patriotism to the ice.

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There was tit for tat scoring between Canada and the US at this, the final of the four nations face off. And then as you just heard, Connor McDavid settled things in overtime, putting Canada had three to two. This was more than just a hockey tournament. It was a place to channel national pride, a place for Canada to reaffirm its supremacy in hockey and a place for Canadians to show strength as the American president repeats

almost daily that he wants to make our country the 51st state. Bruce Arthur is a Canadian sports writer and a columnist for the Toronto Star. Greg Wyshinski is an American senior NHL repeats almost daily that he wants to make our country the 51st state. Bruce Arthur is a Canadian sports writer and a columnist for the Toronto Star. Greg Wyshinski is an American senior NHL writer for ESPN. Hello and good morning to you both.

Good morning, Peter. Guys. Good morning, Peter. I wish, I wish it was under better, better circumstances. What do you mean? These are great circumstances, Greg. And so great that, you know,

I'm gonna have to give Bruce the first opportunity to go ahead and gloat for a moment here. Bruce, have at it. I think for Canada, we've won hockey tournaments before, right? Not in a long time. The NHL has kind of wasted best on best for over a decade. Now the last true best on best at the senior men's level

was the 2014 Olympics. And if you think back to that, that actually was not a tournament that held a lot of drama. That team was so good, it absolutely crushed the idea that hockey is at its best, a sport in which you kill yourself to win a coin flip. That really, but this tournament and this American team, the Americans over the last 10 years

have gotten much better. This American team is awesome. Side to side, front to back, best goalie in the world. They were missing Matthew Kachuk for most of this game, who's one of their best players. Quinn Hughes, the Vancouver Canucks defenseman, didn't play in this tournament. He's one of the two best defensemen in the world.

But for Canada to win this tournament, the way that Canada did the in the political circumstances, this was the most explicitly politically coded win. In Canadian hockey history, I would argue even more so than the 1972 summit series because in 1972, maybe implicitly, Russia was threatening to annex us, but not explicitly. Right. Greg, I wonder what it was like from your perspective. You were in the room in the barn in Boston last night. What was the moment like? Was there sort of one electrical moment that stood out? Yeah. I think the word that we use is inevitability because Connor McDavid had

been so absent curiously for a lot of the game, as he even referenced last night during his post game interview. And, and, you know, I was in Vancouver as well for the 2010 Olympics and, and, uh, the entire couple of days leading up to this game last night, I was experiencing some PTSD because I'm like, okay, I remember beating candidate in group play. And then we played them again for a championship and then Sidney Crosby scored an overtime and I felt really terrible. And I really hope that doesn't happen again.

And it happened again, where the,, where the guy grabbing the torch from Sidney Crosby to become the de facto leader of Team Canada for probably the next 15 years, Connor McDavid, he has his moment. I think the parallels are undeniable and ruin the party for us. As Bruce mentioned, of course, this was a very important tournament for the Americans. The first win on Saturday was a seminal moment in recent hockey history for this country with the amount of people paying attention to the sport that usually don't. The seeds are there. I mean, they've been planted for the 2026 Olympics for this team to come back and really do something special, which hasn't been done since 1980 in this country winning a gold medal in the Olympics. But certainly felt like unfinished

business for the Americans last night. I saw in the background of the pregame that they were showing clips from Miracle on Ice the last time the Americans pulled that off. The stands looked like a really interesting, you know, you can only get so much from the broadcast, but like there's a lot of Canadian fans in there. A lot a lot of backing and forthing of, of chanting and, and booing and cheering. How high were the emotions in the Boston, uh, in the rink last night? They were high.

I, you know, it's funny, you should bring up the, the, the split building though. I asked John Cooper about what he thought the atmosphere was going to be like before the game and Canada's coach. Kind of pointed to how homogenous and together the thought the atmosphere was going to be like before the game and Canada's coach kind of pointed to how homogenous and together the Canadian crowd was when in Montreal, it was probably like 95% Canadian fans. The game last night, it was pretty clear even in warmups. There were a lot of Canadians that paid a lot of money to be in this arena for the championship

game between the U US and Canada. And I did feel if I had to give it a scale of one to 10 as far as the American crowd, I'd probably give it like a 7.5. I thought the Canadians were loud and proud and I did not feel like the Boston crowd was always doing its best to motivate the Americans at all times. There were kind of portions of the game that were a little eerily silent, but maybe that's just because they've sensed what was going to happen. The nerves man.

Yeah. Bruce, for fans, you know, I talked to so many people through the course of this tournament, but as we headed into the final, for fans, it was such an explicitly political moment. It was a chance to vent about the tariffs and about the 51st state business. How, how much does any of that stuff matter to the players?

I mean, they get to take home a championship. They get to hold the, you know, the, the, the supremacy and hockey thing high, but how much do you think the politics of this weighed on them? I didn't see any, any from the players that led me to believe that they truly either grasped the political moment or were willing to engage with it at any kind of high level. And that's understandable. Most of the players on this Canadian team and most of the players on the American team play for American teams in the NHL

This is not a sport that embraces politics almost in any way And if it does it does it kind of you know in a way where it's about a more conservative Anti-politics But I'll say this I don't think you needed the players to understand that. Because no matter what, I think it was it was Brandon Hagel who said that earlier in this tournament, because he fought to start that American game. Fighting doesn't happen in international hockey, right? Like we know that. But he said like, I didn't do it for the cameras, I did it for the country.

Canadian players will always go to the wall. There is a history of this, there is a myth of this. What Wish said about Sidney Crosby scoring in 2010 and Connor McDavid scoring to win this tournament, both in overtime, both against the Americans, there is a through line of how you are expected to play when you play for Canada. And it's real. It's not a made-up thing. And so they didn't need to understand that. After the game, what John Cooper said, the coach of

Team Canada, before the game he kind of joked about it a little bit, but after the game he said, I think the quote was, did we need a win, not just our team, but Canada needed a win. And he said that the players took that on their shoulders and they took it seriously. I think you saw that. I don't know if it would have been any different, honestly.

I don't know if this Canadian team plays any differently if Canada and and the U.S. have a normal relationship, which we don't have now, I think they still play that game hard. This game, though, any Canadian watching that game could feel it. They could feel how much this game meant in a different way, I think, than any hockey game, honestly, in living memory. I'm DenaRaston I'm Dena Temple-Raston, the host of the Click Here podcast from Record of Future News. Twice a week, we tell true stories about the people making and breaking our digital world. And these days, our digital world is being overrun by hackers. Ruth I was just targeted by a nation state.

Dena And they range from reflective. It's a crime, bro. And I live with that every day. To ruthless. Do you feel guilty about it? No, not really. Click here from Recorded Future News. You can find us wherever you get your podcasts.

Greg, you wore a big fuzzy American flag hat on a podcast earlier this week. Did the tournament bring out some, some patriotic streaks in you and your fellow Americans? You know, it's an, it's an interesting question. I'm always going to be very patriotic about this hockey team. I mean, I've been a hockey fan my entire life before I was ever a journalist or a podcaster and I've waited my entire life to watch my hockey team beat Canada in a meaningful way. You know I feel like it's the video game Donkey Kong where Canada is Donkey Kong and the Americans keep climbing ladders but getting hit in the head with barrels every time we get close to the top. But I

have to admit and I've been candid about this it is it is sometimes difficult to do the things that American fans love to do in these situations when everything is happening geopolitically, when there is that undercurrent of what's happening between our countries. Normally, I would not only wear the fuzzy hat, but also declare that we are going to conquer Canada in this game. Well, that's difficult to do what we might actually conquer Canada. It kind of takes the fun out of it a little bit when and you can't necessarily play the Chef the chest puffing jingoistic role that you usually play

I think Bruce said it right, you know The the politics were kind of kept at arm's length in this tournament as best as best they could I thought Hagel's line about the Fighting for the flag was more of a direct shot at the Kachuk brothers. I think so. For the cameras than anything else. But but it is funny to see how hard as hard as they tried to keep it out, they couldn't keep it out. I mean, when Bill Garrett, the GM of the US team goes on Fox News, and then President Trump calls into the team, mostly talking about his success on the golf course and not hockey, but it sort of becomes impossible to separate what's happening on the outside

and on the inside in certain moments, uh, as much as they tried to keep it at bay. Remarkable though in, in the, I think it was the morning of the game or maybe the day before of the final, Matthew Kachuck was asked about the importance of the game. And he said that the tournament was way better than he had ever expected. That, but he said that this is the most important game in my life. This is the guy who played in the last two Stanley cup finals and won one of them. The stakes were high, Greg.

The stakes were enormously high. And you have to remember the reason the four nations face off, I think the secret sauce, the reason it was such a success, yes, there is that geopolitical undercurrent that really spiced up things and yes, there is the general animosity between these two hockey programs. But it's also this generation of players, as Bruce mentioned, waiting several years for their chance to represent their countries in a best on best tournament. The Chucks have never gotten the chance.

Austin Matthews, you know, Connor McDavid, Nathan McKinnon, Kale McCarty. These guys have waited so long for their shot to continue the legacies of their respective nations hockey programs. And you know, in the Kachucks case, look, they know what's on the table. Beating Canada is not something other generations

of Americans have been able to do. And then on top of that next year, they're trying to win the first gold medals since 1980. And again, not to put the rivalry in sharp relief, but Wayne Gretzky came out for Canada last night to like announce the lineups. And Mike Garuzioni came out for us. Our legacy is tied to something that happened in 1980.

And Mike Garuzioni is still the flag bearer for American hockey all these years later. That's, that's why we got to win the gold medal next year. We got to refresh this thing. Bruce, it is interesting though, that like the, the fierce competition between Canada and the United States is kind of well known, but it used to be the Russians that were the big bad rivals. Did, did you ever imagine that we get to this kind of level of animosity

between the men's side of Canada and the US? I think this was in some ways predictable because Greg's right that when Mike Arrazoni comes out, the United States in hockey is still defined by being an underdog. But if you look at the quality of the program now, if you look at the number of people playing, if you look at the number of rinks, if you look at the number of rinks, if you look at the number of players drafted, they have so many more players. They have such pride in the program now.

It really is different. If you go back and look at that 2010 Olympic team, remember, Canada wins that game in overtime. There might be four players on that American team that make Team Canada in 2010. And if you look now, this American team had almost no weaknesses. They played Canada right even, all the way through.

The difference between us and the Americans hockey-wise is they have better goalies. We stopped learning how have better goalies. We stopped learning how to make goalies and we still create the most special players. We still create the McDavid's, the McKinnon's, the McCarr's and no one else in the world does that. Not the way we do. That is the end product of the Gladiator Academy that we kind of created in terms of hockey. And in terms of the animosity, the Americans want to beat us.

They really want to beat us. We are the big brother, we're the bully. And the thing is, we just, we keep winning. Greg, the tournament was such a massive success. The NBA wants to replicate it. How do you think this last week or so is going to be remembered? I think it's going to be remembered finally. I think a lot of people got to experience the best version of our sport. I mean, and that includes three fights in nine seconds in Montreal.

I mean, that is undoubtedly the thing that one of the things that makes hockey unique and makes hockey special. And the quality of play in these two games, the US and Canada, really put that on display. Now, as usual, we always say, well, the Olympics were such a hit. I'm sure that's gonna have a huge impact on the NHL. And then the same people who tuned in for overtime with USA Canada are gonna settle in and watch, you know,

Ottawa and Columbus on a Tuesday. And you know, it's not necessarily the same vibe. But that being said, I do think the biggest change for me in this tournament, besides obviously resetting the USA-Canada rivalry, as Bruce mentioned, in a way where those World Junior wins the US has been stacking up, kind of feed into this idea that for the first time maybe we can go toe to toe with Canada and maybe this tournament kind of gives you a little bit more hope that that can happen in the years going forward. I think what it does is really broadens the horizons of what the NHL is going to try to do going forward. I have a story coming out later today on espn.com talking

about the future of the NHL All-Star game for For example, there's one of the, on the books for next year. They don't know what's happening after that. It could be anything. I think the horizons have been completely broadened by the success of this tournament in North America to the point where we are going to go back to the Olympics next year, two years later, a world cup two years after that, the Olympics, that's the cadence, but in those years in between, I wouldn't be shocked if there's some kind of summit series between the U S and Canada. Olympics, that's the cadence. But in those years in between, I wouldn't be shocked

if there's some kind of summit series between the US and Canada. Oh, I sure hope so. Yeah, just to feed this beast, and there's an appetite for it now. And I think that the four nations was successful beyond their imagination, the rights holders' imagination, and in many cases, the players' imagination.

Indeed. All right, I'm gonna have to leave it there, but guys, I really appreciate you making time. Thanks for this. Thanks, Peter. Bruce Arthur is a sports writer and columnist for the Toronto Star. Greg Wachinski is a senior NHL writer for ESPN. For more CBC podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.