Looking Back At The Canucks Performances From The 4 Nations Faceoff

Yesterday, February 12, marked the one-year anniversary of the 4 Nations Faceoff, during which two members of the Vancouver Canucks — Elias Pettersson and Kevin Lankinen — represented their respective countries. The tournament, which spanned a little over a week’s time, took place in both Montréal and Boston. While neither Pettersson nor Lankinen’s teams won the tournament, overall, the experience was a great one for hockey fans as a whole.  

Many couldn’t say they saw the massive success of this tournament coming, but sure enough, it came. The NHL introduces the 4 Nations Faceoff after a good run of underperforming All-Star weekends, with Canada, USA, Sweden, and Finland being the four countries included in the tournament. With this being the first non-World Championship international tournament NHL players were allowed to take part in since the World Cup of Hockey in 2016, some viewed these four countries’ rosters as a good preview to what their 2026 Winter Olympic teams could look like. 

Pettersson and Sweden opened the tournament on February 12 with a match against a super-powered Team Canada in Montréal. Despite many favouring Canada, the game was a close one — Sidney Crosby and Canada won by a narrow score of 4–3 in overtime. Even Brad Marchand, who many fans in Montréal would have been tempted to boo due to his history with the Boston Bruins at the time, received praise from the home crowd. 

Lankinen and Finland were the next team to start their tournament, though they didn’t end up finding as much success. Juuse Saros started for Finland, though he and his team allowed six goals in their 6–1 loss to Team USA. As a result of the score, Lankinen started for Finland in their next game, which took place on February 15 against Pettersson and Sweden. 

While Lankinen did ultimately start against Sweden and get his team their first win of the tournament, the biggest game of the day was the matchup between Canada and the U.S. With a huge crowd providing the soundtrack of raucous cheers, three fights broke out within the first nine seconds. Clips from this game went viral, with sports fans throughout both countries tuning into the tournament after hearing of what occurred that Saturday night. 

Lankinen ended up playing in the rest of Finland’s games after then, suffering a 5–3 loss to Canada as the tournament shifted to Boston. On the same day, Sweden handed Team USA their first loss of the tournament, winning by a score of 2–1 thanks to Gustav Nyquist and Jesper Bratt. Sweden ultimately finished ahead of Finland in the standings, mostly in part due to the overtime point rules. 

The biggest game on the dockett for the Boston part of the tournament was, of course, the gold-medal game that saw Canada and the U.S. face one-another once again. With the politically-charged energy behind this matchup and Canada’s 3–1 defeat in their previous game, all eyes were on this match. In fact, this game was so highly-anticipated that it drew in viewership numbers of 16.1 million throughout North America. 9.3 million of these came from the U.S., while Canada registered 6.3 million as per NHL.com.  

This game was deadlocked at two goals apiece throughout a good portion of the match, with both teams appearing equally-matched heading into the third period. Canada goaltender Jordan Binnington and USA goaltender Connor Hellebuyck did exactly what both their teams needed them to do in the high-stakes moments, which was to make every save possible. Regulation passed, forcing both teams into overtime. Finally, it was Edmonton Oilers captain Connor McDavid who won it for Canada, firing the puck past Hellebuyck and sealing the deal 8:18 into the extra frame. 

With the 2026 Winter Olympics now underway, the 4 Nations Faceoff provided both the NHL and international teams with a good gauge of who they should bring with them to the biggest stage in the world. Not just that, but it also showed that there’s still a big helping of international interest in best-on-best hockey despite NHLers not being present at the Olympics for over 10 years. Fans can expect to see even more international NHL competition when the World Cup of Hockey returns in February 2028, allowing for more than just the four nations to compete. 

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