"Quinn Hughes Is Coming": Canada Thought They Got Lucky With Charlie McAvoy Missing The 4 Nations Final. Think Again, Bozos
Derek Cain. Getty Images.Let's rewind the clock back to February 22, 1980. A couple weeks prior to the United States squaring off against the Soviet Union in the medal round of the 1980 Winter Olympics, Jack O'Callahan suffered a knee injury. It kept him out of the entirety of the preliminary round of those Olympics. Herb Brooks could have cut him from the team before the Olympics started to open up an extra roster spot for the Americans, but he knew the team would need OC at some point. So he kept him around under the condition that OC not even think about asking to play before he was cleared to play.
He was able to come back just in time for the game against the Soviets in the medal round, and helped USA pull off the biggest win in American hockey history.
45 years later and here we are. Quinn Hughes was one of the first 6 players announced to be on Team USA's roster for the 4 Nations Face-Off. But a few weeks before the event got going, he was sidelined with an injury. He hasn't played in a game since January 31st. Even with missing the last 4 games before the break, Quinn Hughes is a top 20 point scorer in the league so far this year. 59 points in 47 games as a defenseman is just sickening stuff out of the reigning Norris Trophy winner. So losing Quinn Hughes was a massive blow for Team USA before the tournament got going.
Now Team USA was dealt another massive blow after Charlie "McDavid Killer" McAvoy will be missing Thursday night's final game after being hospitalized with some sort of infection from an injury.
And just like OC coming back for the medal round game against the Soviets, now it's starting to look like Quinn Hughes might be making it back into the lineup just in time for this final matchup against the Canadians.
Now the rules here are a little wonky. So far it seems like Quinn Hughes won't actually be allowed to play unless Team USA loses another defenseman, and they don't have enough guys on defense to fill out the roster. Since they still have 6 D right now, I guess Quinn Hughes wouldn't be eligible to hop into the lineup just yet. But that gives Team USA 36 hours to finagle some sort of "injury" to one of their defensemen. No offense to Jake Sanderson or anything, but maybe he'll need to get a little bit of food poisoning for the boys. It would be the ultimate sacrifice for the ultimate team sport.
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Moral of the story here is that this is how much this means to these guys. Quinn Hughes was too injured to play in this tournament a week ago, but now he's willing to get back out there on the ice to help the boys take down Canada and be on top of the hockey world. LeBron couldn't even play through a stubbed toe in the All-Star Game, but Quinn Hughes is going to come back early from an injury because that's what his country needs of him right now. Hughes vs Makar on the world's biggest stage. You can skip paying your electric bill this month because Thursday night should give you all the juice you need.
P.S. -- Quinn Hughes. Auston Matthews. Brady Tkachuk. Funny how Canadian teams all need Americans to be their captains. Guess they lack leadership qualities up there.
P.P.S. -- I've been pretty down on Jack Hughes this whole tournament so far. I think what we're realizing here is that he's not built for this type of environment. He's not a playoff hockey type of player, and he seems to disappear once the game gets physical. But maybe having his brother out there with him will unlock the same sort of lunatic mode that it does for the Tkachuks.