NHL Introduces the Four Nations Face Off
And an Athlete Spotlight on Meghan Duggan
The NHL All-Star Game has struggled to keep fans engaged for the past few years. Ratings have been down year over year since 2017. The NHL tried several ways to get fans in, and last year, it sort of worked.
The 2024 NHL All-Star Game saw a 31% increase in viewership from 2023 but was still down significantly from 2017. The skills competition was viewed more favorably than the All-Star Game. Viewers were also drawn in for the PWHL 3-on-3 showcase.
Instead of capitalizing on the success, the NHL announced a new tournament-style game called the Four Nations Face-Off.
The Four Nations Face-Off will be held from February 12-20, 2025, in Montreal and Boston, with teams of NHL players from Finland, Sweden, Canada, and the United States competing in a round-robin tournament. Each team consists of 13 forwards, seven defensemen, and three goalies. This will be the first best-on-best tournament since the World Cup of Hockey 2016.
For team rosters, please visit the NHL website.
Not all NHL players seem to be embracing this new competition.
Sunday afternoon, the Vegas Golden Knights announced Alex Pietrangelo would be “withdrawing” from the Four Nations Face-Off “to tend to an ailment and prepare for the remainder of the regular season with Vegas.”
A couple of hours later, the defenseman logged 24:22 in ice time during a 4-1 win against the Florida Panthers.
This has led some to speculate that some NHL players are treating the tournament as nothing more than another low-stakes version of an All-Star Game and that it is worth skipping.
Pietrangelo might be the first to withdraw, but he’s certainly not the last. Goaltender Jocab Markstrom has pulled out following a UCL sprain, and Team Finland has already lined up Urho Vaakanainen as a replacement for Jani Hakanpaa. Team USA is also awaiting news on Charlie McAvoy, who was put on injured reserve earlier this month. There’s a good chance more players will drop from the tournament.
After all, this competition is not the Olympics. It’s not even the World Cup. Powerhouse hockey countries like Russia, Czechia, and Slovakia aren’t even part of it.
This tournament comes at a terrible time in the NHL schedule. At this point in the season, star players need a break from the wear and tear of playing four months of hockey. Instead, most will go head-to-head in a condensed round-robin tournament that could lead to more injuries. And while the NHL All-Star game has historically been played in February, that’s one weekend, not two weeks.
Toronto Maple Leafs fans have also expressed concerns about management allowing Auston Matthews, who has missed considerable time this season with a nagging shoulder injury, to participate on Team USA. Matthews was just named captain of Team USA yesterday.
Not all players and fans are concerned about the tournament, though. Los Angeles Kings player Drew Doughty who missed the first the first part of the season, has already said, “I don’t want a break; I want to play.”
The NHL Four Nations Face-Off kicks off on Wednesday, February 12, at 8 p.m. EST on truTV, TNT, and MAX.
Athlete Spotlight: Meghan Duggan
For the first three decades of her life, reaching the peak of women’s hockey was Meghan Duggan’s driving force. She had her eyes set on an Olympic gold medal.
The journey wasn’t easy. It seemed like it could happen in 2014 until Team USA lost the lead to Canada in the 2014 gold-medal game. She eventually got there. In 2018, with Duggan as captain, Team USA beat Canada in a shootout to take home Olympic gold. She did it.
That gold medal game was the last time Duggan ever played for Team USA.
“Being a player for so long and everything that comes with that, there’s always that identity crisis of ‘I’ve thrown my entire life into something since I can remember, and now I’m still a really passionate, driven person, and what can I put that into?’” Duggan said in an interview with The Athletic.
Knowing she wanted to stay in hockey post-retirement, Duggan worked to find her next chapter. Throughout her career, people around the sport told her to reach out if she needed anything. Those comments weren’t throw-aways to Duggan. She took them up on it.
That initiative ultimately brought Duggan to the New Jersey Devils and the role of Director of Player Development. It could lead her to even higher peaks in the coming years. She now has her sights set on becoming an NHL General Manager.
“I’ve always been someone that [thinks], ‘Why not set a huge, lofty goal for myself?’” she said. “I did that when I was a young kid. It takes a long time to get there and a lot of hard work, but I’m not afraid to set a big goal.”
One of Duggan’s early phone calls in her post-playing career was to Ray Shero, who won the 2009 Stanley Cup with the Pittsburgh Penguins as General Manager. She’d previously connected with Shero through USA Hockey, and he put her in touch with ten other people to talk to, including New Jersey GM Tom Fitzgerald.
When speaking with Duggan for the first time, Fitzgerald was struck by her hockey IQ and passion for the sport. She had a matter-of-fact attitude, and Fitzgerald liked her playing experience. He also knew she was talking with other teams.
In speaking with his staff, Fitzgerald said, “We need to hire her before someone else does. I don’t want to lose her.”
In May 2021, Fitzgerald hired Duggan as Manager of Player Development, a newly created role. She was also the first known openly gay person to work in an NHL front office. A year later, the team promoted her to her current position.
“She’s a big help for our organization,” added 21-year-old Luke Hughes, one of the young players the Devils have developed.
Now that Duggan is in her fourth season with the Devils, she has seen players like Hughes go through the full evolution from prospect to player. Fitzgerald says Duggan has a plan for every prospect in the organization, and she, Fitzgerald, and the front office go through those plans to make sure everybody is in sync.
Along with her Devils responsibilities, Duggan is a special consultant to hockey operations for the PWHL. Her focuses include rules and competition, how to evolve the game, and of course, player development.
Duggan juggles her professional life with raising three children all under the age of five. Duggan and her wife, three-time Olympic gold medalist Gillian Apps, rely on full-time help, as well as family help, so they can both pursue their careers.
“I’m not going to sugarcoat it: balancing being a working parent is really hard,” she shared. “But you find ways to make it work.”
Duggan doesn’t have a set timeline for becoming a GM, but she views it as a set goal. As she’s shown before, she finds a way to achieve her goals.
U.S Figure Skating Mourns Skaters, Coaches in Airline Crash
As a member of the figure skating community, I want to take a moment to remember the young skaters who lost their lives in the tragic accident when American Airlines Flight 5342 collided with a military Blackhawk helicopter. While I personally don’t know any of the skaters or coaches who were on the flight, the figure skating community is small. We all feel this loss.
We all know what it’s like to be on a high following a marquee event like the National Championships.
We all know what it’s like to celebrate the hard work, passion, and dedication of our friends…even if they’re also our competition.
My heart is shattered thinking about the young skaters who spent the days after the competition at the elite development camp, eager to see what the future held for them. They were more than national titles, more than competitors, more than a title.
Victims of AA5342
Spencer Lane (Athlete – Skating Club of Boston)
Jinna Han (Athlete – Skating Club of Boston)
Vadim Naumov (Coach – Skating Club of Boston)
Evgenia Shishkova (Coach – Skating Club of Boston)
Eddie Zhou (Athlete – Skating Club of Northern Virginia)
Everly Livingston (Athlete – Washington Figure Skating Club)
Alydia Livingston (Athlete – Washington Figure Skating Club)
Franco Aparicio (Athlete – Washington Figure Skating Club)
Inna Volyanskaya (Coach – Washington Figure Skating Club)
Sean Kay (Athlete – University of Delaware Figure Skating Club)
Angela Yang (Athlete – University of Delaware Figure Skating Club)
Brielle Beyer (Athlete - Skating Club of Northern Virginia)
Cory Haynos (Athlete - Skating Club of Northern Virginia)
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