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BOSTON — The game between the United States and Sweden on Monday night may have had zero tournament implications, but there are no shifts off in the sport of hockey when donning your country’s colors.
Pride was still on the line, especially for Sweden, which lost its first two games in overtime before pulling out a 2-1 win over Team USA in front of a packed house at TD Garden in the 4 Nations Face-Off.
No team in this tournament has been spared of injuries or illness, a testament to the quality of play and investment from players.
But now Team USA will go into the two off days before Thursday’s final with uncertainty surrounding their lineup.
Especially regarding Bruins defenseman Charlie McAvoy, who was admitted to Mass General Hospital with an upper-body injury, according to the Boston Globe.
Head coach Mike Sullivan had ruled forward Matthew Tkachuk (lower body) and McAvoy out in the morning, which forced the Americans to ice a lineup with 11 forwards against Sweden.
News then broke during warmups that USA captain Auston Matthews wouldn’t play, either, due to upper-body soreness.
Concern hit a different level, however, when Brady Tkachuk awkwardly crashed into the post in the first period Monday night.
He headed to the locker room, missed maybe a couple of turns in the rotation and then returned for a 14-second shift. Instead of going down the tunnel again, Brady Tkachuk stayed on the bench for the remainder of the period, but was ruled out for the rest of the game following the first intermission.
“We held him out more for precautionary reasons at that point,” Sullivan said of Brady. “I haven’t got an update to this point after the game yet, so we’ll see how it responds, but I don’t anticipate it being an issue. Yeah, it’s not easy. We lose a guy that early in the game. We’re already down one. We tried to spread the minutes around a little bit so nobody got an extensive workload. But when you’re down two guys that early in the game, it is what it is. I thought the guys competed hard.”
Brady assured on Matthew’s behalf, after he missed the final 12:36 of the USA-Canada game, that his brother would be ready for the rematch with Canada.
It’s safe to assume Matthew would probably say the same about Brady.
Matthew essentially assured he’d be playing on Thursday when he joined the TNT broadcast booth with Kenny Albert and Eddie Olczyk, saying he’s expecting the best environment he’s ever played in and he’s excited.
There’s no way to quantify what the Tkachuk brothers have meant to not only Team USA, but also the tournament. Losing even just one would be a major hit to the Americans in a multitude of ways.
Sullivan said Team USA hasn’t started the process of contacting reserve players in case they need them.
“We’re hopeful we’re going to get some of these guys back,” he said. “I would anticipate we would. We’ll have to wait and see how things play out here over the next day or so, but obviously there will be contingency planning in the event that we need people.”
The flu appears to be going around the tournament, as well.
Sweden was hit particularly hard, with Rangers forward Mika Zibanejad and Rickard Rakell scratched due to illness. Canada’s Cale Makar missed the first Canada-USA game due to illness, too, but was well enough to play against Finland on Monday afternoon.
So it was a night for the extra American skaters. Sometimes, the story just writes itself.
And Chris Kreider’s start to his 4 Nations debut was something out of a fairytale.
After getting introduced as a starter to a raucous applause from his hometown crowd, the Rangers forward put back a rebound 35 seconds into his first shift to give Team USA a 1-0 lead.
He did it while skating on the United States’ top line with Jack Eichel and Brady Tkachuk, two players the Rangers have explicitly expressed interest in at times throughout Kreider’s New York tenure.
“It was awesome, first shift, too,” Rangers teammate J.T. Miller said of watching Kreider open the scoring. “Chris has been a hell of a teammate and to get the chance to come in today and produce and get on the scoreboard, happy for him.”
Sweden made its push from there as the Americans briefly lost Brady Tkachuk.
Gustav Nyquist tied it up later in the opening frame before Devils forward Jesper Bratt netted the game-winning goal with 56 seconds left on the clock.
The injury scares just kept coming, with Vincent Trocheck appearing to hurt his right hand on his last shift of the first.
He headed down the tunnel before the period finished, but returned for the second.
Trocheck was able to finish the game, but didn’t look totally comfortable. He said he was alright after the game.
