Open Thread: Team Canada vs. Team Sweden (6:00 p.m.)

It’s a 4 Nations Face-Off game day!

The wait is finally over, as we will see a best-on-best and international tournament between four nations of supreme hockey pedigree. This unorthodox tournament will crown one country’s team a true champion. Will it be Canada, the birthplace of hockey, or Sweden, the country that’s offered some of the game’s (and Avs’) greatest players? Perhaps the perennial favorite USA team steals the show, but don’t you sleep on the feisty Finns! It all starts tonight with Canada and Sweden at Bell Centre in Montreal.

Team Canada

This Canadian team should be a must-watch television with the likes of MacKinnon, Crosby, McDavid, Makar, etc. The roster continues to churn out proven and legit hockey prowess. It remains to be seen how Jon Cooper will deploy this talent, but with this much skill on a roster, you almost can’t screw it up.

We cover the Avalanche around here, so it won’t be hard to root for the Maple Leaf tonight, and I’d expect Cale Makar and Devon Toews to remain D partners and be featured as Team Canada’s top pair. It makes sense to lean on that familiarity, even if you could argue there’s a better Dman than Toewser. I’d also expect (at a minimum) Crosby, MacKinnon, and McDavid to be a part of Team Canada’s PP1.
The only reason Team Canada isn’t the favorite in the 4 Nations Face-Off is a lack of confidence between the pipes. For now, it’s Jordan Binnington protecting the net for the team in red. He won’t be getting a ton of slack in our neck of the woods, but he’s a Stanley Cup-winning goalie with plenty of ability.

By the way, I doubt anyone outside of those who live to be outraged is actually upset about Cale Makar getting #8 over Drew Doughty. Team Canada made Makar #8 jerseys to be produced and sold before Doughty was announced as part of the team.

Projected Lineup:

Sam Reinhart — Connor McDavid — Mitch Marner
Sidney Crosby — Nathan MacKinnon — Mark Stone
Brad Marchand — Brayden Point — Seth Jarvis
Brandon Hagel — Anthony Cirelli — Travis Konecny

Devon Toews — Cale Makar
Josh Morrissey — Colton Parayko
Shea Theodore — Drew Doughty

Team Sweden

All four countries have a real chance of winning this tournament, and Sweden is no different. Filip Forsberg, Elias Pettersson, and Adrian Kempe should form the first forward group. Still, I’m keying on the second line, particularly on Willy Nylander, who, believe it or not, has scored just 16 fewer goals (113) than his fellow Toronto superstar Auston Matthews (129) over the last three NHL seasons. We also can’t sleep on this defensive group with future HOFer Victor Hedman at the helm alongside Jonas Brodin.

Slight concern arises in the net for the Swedes, as they will be without Jacub Markstrom due to a knee injury. That leaves Filip Gustavsson, Linus Ullmark, and Samuel Ersson to choose from. It does appear that it will be Gustavsson’s net at least to start things tonight.

Projected Lineup:

Filip Forsberg — Elias Pettersson — Adrian Kempe
Rickard Rakell — Mika Zibanejad — William Nylander
Jesper Bratt — Joel Eriksson Ek — Lucas Raymond
Viktor Arvidsson — Elias Lindholm — Gustav Nyquist

Victor Hedman — Jonas Brodin
Mattias Ekholm — Erik Karlsson
Gustav Forsling — Rasmus Dahlin
Note: Team Sweden will also miss the services of Gabe Landeskog, a staple of his nation’s team, before the injury that has kept him from competing since game 6 of the 2022 Stanley Cup Final.