Connor Hellebuyck was part of the electrifying under-23 Team North America squad at the 2016 World Cup of Hockey.
But having just completed his rookie season and with only 26 games of NHL experience to his name, Hellebuyck didn’t see the ice.
Now eight years later, the American goalie still hasn’t competed in a best-on-best tournament.
“I’ve just been waiting to throw that jersey on. My window’s now, I’m in my prime and I’d love to be part of it,” the Winnipeg Jets goalie said at NHL all-star media day on Thursday.
On Friday, commissioner Gary Bettman announced that NHL players would return to the Olympics in 2026 and 2030. The 2026 Games will be held in Italy, while it is expected that France will be chosen to host the 2030 Games later this year.
The NHL also announced a four-team international tournament for 2025 that will include Canada, the United States, Sweden and Finland. The Four Nations Face-off will be held next February in two yet-to-be-named cities in Canada and the United States.
“We know how important international competition is to our players. We know how much they love and want to represent the countries from which they’re from, and we think this ia great stage for the best on best in what obviously we all believe is the best sport,” Bettman said.
NHL players haven’t participated in either of the last two Olympics. Nor has there been a World Cup since that 2016 edition, and even that tournament featured two gimmicky teams, with North America consisting of under-23 players and a Team Europe covering most of the continent except a few countries.
Eager to compete alongside fellow stars
In the meantime, the NHL is reportedly putting together a four-team tournament for 2025 between Canada, the U.S., Sweden and Finland. It’s still not a true best-on-best — not without the Russians or the Czechs — but it’s closer.
Speaking on Thursday, Edmonton Oilers superstar Connor McDavid said he wants to compete at the Olympics “extremely badly.”
“I would say that a lot of other guys in my age group would feel the same way,” he said. “I think about the U-23 team, a lot of guys that are here, Nate [MacKinnon], guys like Cale Makar and Jack Eichel and Auston [Matthews, all these guys that haven’t had a chance to represent their country at a best on best. I think it’s something that we’re all hoping to do.”
McDavid, left, and MacKinnon, right, both said they were excited about the prospect of competing at the 2026 Olympics. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press)
MacKinnon, the Cole Harbour, N.S., native from the same hometown as Sidney Crosby, echoed the sentiment.
“I’d love to go. I grew up idolizing Team Canadas and we’ve all missed two or three now, so definitely want to get one in, or hopefully a couple before I retire,” he said.
“We have the best player in the league with Connor and hopefully get another one out of Sid. I still think he’s ageless, so I’d love to play with him and trying to win with him would be pretty special as well.”
Hockey Canada president and CEO Katherine Henderson said representing your country at the Olympics is the “pinnacle” of the sport.
“We are excited to begin the process of building teams that include the best Canadian NHL players from across the country for the first time since the 2016 World Cup of Hockey, and to surround those athletes with high-quality management, coaching and support staffs that will do everything they can to help our athletes achieve their goal of winning Olympic gold medals,” Henderson said.
Indeed, multiple factors have kept the best men’s players in the world out of the Olympics, from insurance issues between the NHL, NHLPA and IIHF in 2018 to the pandemic in 2022.
On Thursday, Columbus Blue Jackets NHLPA representative Boone Jenner expressed hope of a deal coming together for 2026.
“I know the [Players’ Assocation is] working really hard behind the scenes with the league to find something of a solution there, hopefully get something set in stone,” said Canadian Boone Jenner, the captain of the Columbus Blue Jackets and the team’s PA representative.
Now one day later, it’s official.
“We know that hockey fans worldwide have long been anticipating the next best-on-best international competition, and now they can finally see some of their favourite players represent their countries and line up together,” said NHLPA executive director Marty Walsh.
“We made it,” IIHF president Luc Tardif added. “That’s two years work and more intense the last six months.”
Players’ sexual assault charges not a sign of hockey culture problem: NHL commissioner
When pressed about whether he felt the recent arrests of players for sexual assault pointed toward a systemic culture issue in the NHL and the sport, league commissioner Gary Bettman said to make that characterization would be ‘both inaccurate and unfair’ and that ‘99.9 per cent of the players … conduct themselves appropriately.’
‘Everybody would be excited’
Minnesota Wild star Kirill Kaprizov is one of just a few NHLers remaining with Olympic experience, having played for the Russian team in 2018 before jumping over to North America.
In Pyeongchang, Kaprizov scored the golden goal in overtime.
“Of course I’d like to play at the Olympics for the Russian team, as any Russian NHL player and any player that plays in Russia. Definitely would be happy to represent the national team,” Kaprizov said.
The Russian flag was excluded from each of the past two Winter Olympics due to sanctions over doping and the invasion of Ukraine.
Kaprizov celebrates the Russian team’s gold medal at the 2018 Olympics. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)
Drafted in 2015, Kyle Connor is another player, like his Jets teammate Hellebuyck, who’s missed out on the opportunity to play best-on-best internationally.
Though he said he and Hellebuyck don’t talk about it too often — they are NHL players who may not want to jinx their spot on the team two years out, after all — he said he is itching for the opportunity.
“I think everybody would be excited even if it’s a different format with the four teams, whether it’s exhibition tournament or however they’re going to format it, you know there’s gonna be some competition and everybody’s going to want to win that game,” Connor said.
By the time the Olympics come around, most of that original U-23 team will be at least 30, having missed out on a decade of top international competition.
There’s no getting that time back now. But with Friday’s news, at least all those fantasy Team Canada lines are closer to reality.
EDMONTON – The Edmonton Oilers signed defenceman Travis Dermott to a professional tryout on Friday.
Dermott, a 27-year-old from Newmarket, Ont., produced two goals, five assists and 26 penalty minutes in 50 games with the Arizona Coyotes last season.
The six-foot, 202-pound blueliner has also played for the Vancouver Canucks and Toronto Maple Leafs.
Toronto drafted him in the second round, 34th overall, of the 2015 NHL draft.
Over seven NHL seasons, Dermott has 16 goals and 46 assists in 329 games while averaging 16:03 in ice time.
Before the NHL, Dermott played two seasons with Oilers captain Connor McDavid for the Ontario Hockey League’s Erie Otters. The team was coached by current Edmonton head coach Kris Knoblauch.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 13, 2024.
NEWPORT, R.I. (AP) — Maria Sharapova, a five-time Grand Slam singles champion, led the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s fan vote her first year on the ballot — an important part to possible selection to the hall’s next class.
The organization released the voting results on Friday. American doubles team Bob and Mike Bryan finished second with Canada’s Daniel Nestor third.
The Hall of Fame said tens of thousands of fans from 120 countries cast ballots. Fan voting is one of two steps in the hall’s selection process. The second is an official group of journalists, historians, and Hall of Famers from the sport who vote on the ballot for the hall’s class of 2025.
“I am incredibly grateful to the fans all around the world who supported me during the International Tennis Hall of Fame’s fan votes,” Sharapova said in a statement. “It is a tremendous honor to be considered for the Hall of Fame, and having the fans’ support makes it all the more special.”
Sharapova became the first Russian woman to reach No. 1 in the world. She won Wimbledon in 2004, the U.S. Open in 2006 and the Australian Open in 2008. She also won the French Open twice, in 2012 and 2014.
Sharapova was also part of Russia’s championship Fed Cup team in 2008 and won a silver medal at the London Olympics in 2012.
To make the hall, candidates must receive 75% or higher on combined results of the official voting group and additional percentage from the fan vote. Sharapova will have an additional three percentage points from winning the fan vote.
The Bryans, who won 16 Grand Slam doubles titles, will have two additional percentage points and Nestor, who won eight Grand Slam doubles titles, will get one extra percentage point.
The hall’s next class will be announced late next month.
PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The driver charged with killing NHL hockey player Johnny Gaudreau and his brother Matthew as they bicycled on a rural road had a blood-alcohol level of .087, above the .08 legal limit in New Jersey, a prosecutor said Friday.
Gaudreau, 31, and brother Matthew, 29, were killed in Carneys Point, New Jersey, on Aug. 29, the evening before they were set to serve as groomsmen at their sister Katie’s wedding.
The driver, 43-year-old Sean M. Higgins of nearby Woodstown, New Jersey, is charged with two counts of death by auto, along with reckless driving, possession of an open container and consuming alcohol in a motor vehicle. At a virtual court hearing Friday, a judge ordered that he be held for trial after prosecutors described a history of alleged road rage and aggressive driving.
“’You were probably driving like a nut like I always tell you you do. And you don’t listen to me, instead you just yell at me,’” his wife told Higgins when he called her from jail after his arrest, according to First Assistant Prosecutor Jonathan Flynn of Salem County.
The defense described Higgins as a married father and law-abiding citizen before the crash.
“He’s an empathetic individual and he’s a loving father of two daughters,” said defense lawyer Matthew Portella. “He’s a good person and he made a horrible decision that night.”
Higgins told police he had five or six beers that day and admitted to consuming alcohol while driving, according to the criminal complaint. He also failed a field sobriety test, the complaint said. A prosecutor on Friday said he had been drinking at home after finishing a work call at about 3 p.m., and having an upsetting conversation with his mother about a family matter.
He then had a two-hour phone call with a friend while he drove around in his Jeep with an open container, Flynn said. He had been driving aggressively behind a sedan going just above the 50 mph speed limit, sometimes tailgating, the female driver told police.
When she and the vehicle ahead of her slowed down and veered left to go around the cyclists, Higgins sped up and veered right, striking the Gaudreas, the two other drivers told police.
“He indicated he didn’t even see them,” said Superior Court Judge Michael J. Silvanio, who said Higgins’ admitted “impatience” caused two deaths.
Higgins faces up to 20 years, a sentence that the judge said made him a flight risk.
Higgins has a master’s degree, works in finance for an addiction treatment company, and served in combat in Iraq, his lawyers said. However, his wife said he had been drinking regularly since working from home, Flynn said.
Johnny Gaudreau, known as “Johnny Hockey,” played 10 full seasons in the league and was set to enter his third with the Columbus Blue Jackets after signing a seven-year, $68 million deal in 2022. He played his first eight seasons with the Calgary Flames, a tenure that included becoming one of the sport’s top players and a fan favorite across North America.
Widows Meredith and Madeline Gaudreau described their husbands as attached at the hip throughout their lives. Both women are expecting, and both gave moving eulogies at the double funeral on Monday.
