During the fifth annual Zach Hyman Celebrity Classic at the Oakdale Golf and Country Club in Toronto on July 15, Edmonton Oilers forwards Zach Hyman and Connor McDavid took questions from media.
Though it had only been three weeks since Edmonton lost Game 7 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final to the Florida Panthers, Hyman, McDavid, and other Oilers were already back in the gym, training for 2024-25.
This coming NHL season will feature a break in February for the 4 Nations Face-Off. The inaugural international tournament will take place Feb. 12-20, 2025 in Boston and Montreal, featuring teams of NHL players representing Canada, Finland, Sweden and the United States.
McDavid is one of the first six players that have been named to Team Canada. Coming off a 54-goal season, Hyman has played himself into consideration to be included on Canada’s full roster, which will be announced Nov. 29 – Dec. 2.
Thus, it made sense that Hyman was asked, “Is there any buzz or thoughts among the players as you train about the 4 Nations Face-Off?”
Hyman could have given a stock answer about the 4 Nations Face-Off. He could have said there’s a lot of excitement, that the players are looking forward to the competition, that it’s always a privilege to represent your country, etc., etc., etc.
But the 32-year-old winger didn’t even try to pretend. Before the question was finished, Hyman was already shaking his head, “No”.
“We just lost,” he said, looking and sounding almost a bit incredulous. “You try not to think about hockey for a couple of weeks and now I’m back in the gym and we’re here, and it’s like, ‘Woah, we’re back.’”
Hyman’s response was maybe a bit telling. While there’s no doubt that he would love and be honoured to play for Canada, the only thing on his mind for 2024-25 is winning the Stanley Cup.
That’s understandable because, from this perspective, one can see how players would have a hard time getting all that excited about the 4 Nations Face-Off.
4 Nations Face-Off Field is Limited
Since NHL players last participated in the Olympics, in 2014, there has not been a true best-on-best international hockey tournament. And that isn’t going to change with the 4 Nations Face-Off.
The first issue is right there in the name: 4 Nations. Canada, Finland, Sweden and the United States are certainly four of the top six countries in men’s hockey, but there are glaring omissions.
For starters, there’s the reigning world champions, Czechia. In the five Olympic Games that NHLers participated in from 1998 to 2014, Czechia medaled twice and was one of just three nations to win gold (Canada and Sweden being the other). Also absent are several other nations that medaled in major international events over the last couple of years, including Germany (silver, 2023 Worlds), Latvia (bronze, 2023 Worlds), Slovakia (bronze, 2023 Olympics) and Switzerland (silver, 2024 Worlds).
Finally, there are Russia and Belarus, who have been suspended from international competition by the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) since February 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine. That ban has been extended through the 2024-25 season.
Belarus has never reached the podium in a major international competition, but Russia is a perennial medal contender. With the likes of Kirill Kaprizov, Nikita Kucherov, Artemi Panarin, Andrei Vasilevskiy and Igor Shesterkin on its roster, a Russian team in 2025 would be most capable of winning gold.
4 Nations Face-Off Disrupts the Season
In addition to its limited field, the 4 Nations Face-Off’s placing on the calendar is an issue. The Oilers’ last game before the NHL breaks for the 4 Nations Face-Off will be their 55th of the season, meaning Edmonton will have completed two-thirds of its schedule.
When the NHL temporarily pauses for 12 days beginning Feb. 10, players will have already spent more than four months grinding through the season. Day after day, all they have is poured into their team. Everything else is secondary.
Now, at that point when the NHL playoff race is about to enter its homestretch, they’ll be expected to check out for two weeks and care about what isn’t much more than a series of All-Star Games.
Yes, the Olympic Winter Games also take place in mid-February, and they generate genuine buy-in from NHL participants. But that’s because the Olympics is the ultimate in sport. Representing one’s country on that stage is what every athlete dreams of.
But the Winter Games, this is most certainly not. If we’re being brutally honest, the 4 Nations Face-Off is just the NHL’s latest gimmicky attempt at international competition, following the ill-conceived 2016 rendition of the World Cup of Hockey (that tournament didn’t allow Canadian or American players under age 24 to play for their national squads, instead combining them into Team North America, effectively killing the inherent sense of national pride that makes international competition so special for players and fans alike).
Stanley Cup is the Biggest Concern
All this brings us back to Hyman’s reaction when asked about the 4 Nations Face-Off. Again, none of this is to suggest that Hyman, or anyone in his position, wouldn’t be humbled to be named to Team Canada, nor that he wouldn’t take immense pride in wearing the maple leaf.
But he’s all-in on winning the Stanley Cup. If this is how invested players like Hyman and McDavid are in the third week of July, imagine how they’ll be feeling in the second week of February. And that’s how Oilers fans should want it.
Unless it’s the Olympics, midseason international tournaments just don’t work, especially when the format is as flawed as the 4 Nations Face-Off. The only real concern in Edmonton and with every other team around the league is that their players come back to their day jobs healthy and unhurt.
