USA win over Canada in 4 Nations Face-Off starts with 3 fights — two involving Panthers
It was probably safe to assume the United States vs. Canada game in the 4 Nations Face-Off on Saturday night was going to get chippy.
But this? Maybe not so much.
The opening 10 seconds of the United States’ 3-1 win over Canada at Montreal’s Bell Centre featured not one ... not two ... but three fights between USA and Canada skaters — and naturally, two Florida Panthers stars were involved in the brouhaha.
It began right after the opening faceoff when the USA’s Matthew Tkachuk of the Panthers and Canada’s Brandon Hagel of the Tampa Bay Lightning scrapped it up two seconds into regulation.
Hagel said in an interview with Sportsnet after the first period that Tkachuk asked to fight.
“I’m not backing down from him,” Hagel said.
One second later, it was Canada’s Sam Bennett of the Panthers and the USA’s Brady Tkachuk of the Ottawa Senators who dropped the gloves.
And then just six seconds of regulation time after that, the USA’s J.T. Miller of the New York Rangers and Canada’s Colton Parayko of the St. Louis Blues fought to end the early frenzy.
“I think it just happened pretty organically,” Brady Tkachuk said of the fights in an interview on ABC during the first intermission. “Matthew said he wanted to go first and yeah, just happened. And you know what? It’s over and done with.”
Brady Tkachuk called the emotions of the three fights “an adrenaline rush.”
“Just got to carry that over into each shift now,” he added. “Now, it’s all about playing and doing whatever it takes to win. It’s just another game right now. Obviously, we’ve blocked out all of the noise. All I care about is the 20 guys in that room right now and doing what it takes to win.”
Jake Guentzel scored twice for the United States, tying the game at 1-1 and capping scoring with an empty-net goal. Dylan Larkin scored the go-ahead goal with 6:27 left in the second period. Connor McDavid scored for Canada.
Something to monitor on the Panthers front: Matthew Tkachuk didn’t play the final 12:36 of Saturday’s game against Canada while dealing with an apparent lower-body injury. Tkachuk said postgame he’s not concerned he’ll miss time.
4 Nations Face-Off standings
With the win over Canada, the United States has clinched a spot in the 4 Nations Face-Off championship. Team USA has six points by virtue of its two regulation wins so far — 6-1 over Finland on Thursday and then the Canada win.
Teams receive three points for a regulation win, two for an overtime or shootout win, one for an overtime or shootout loss and zero for a regulation loss.
Canada, Sweden and Finland all have two points entering the final day of round-robin action.
Canada faces Finland at 1 p.m. Monday, while the United States wraps up the round-robin portion of the tournament at 8 p.m. Monday against Sweden. The top two teams after Monday’s games will play in the championship game on Thursday at 8 p.m. The games Monday and Thursday will be played at Boston’s TD Garden.
The Panthers have an NHL-leading eight players involved in the tournament: Tkachuk for the United States, Bennett and Sam Reinhart for Canada, Gustav Forsling for Sweden, and the foursome of Aleksander Barkov, Anton Lundell, Eetu Luostarinen and Niko Mikkola for Finland.
This story was originally published February 15, 2025 at 8:58 PM.
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