It has been confirmed by the Boston Bruins that Team USA defenseman Charlie McAvoy was injured in the 4 Nations round-robin game against Finland on Feb. 13 at the Bell Centre.
They did not confirm the details, but it’s always been suspected in this space that the injury was sustained on the crosscheck from behind by Montreal Canadiens winger Joel Armia that ultimately landed McAvoy in Mass. General and out of tomorrow night’s 4 Nations Face-Off championship game between the U.S. and Canada and potentially out of the entire must-win stretch of hockey facing the Boston Bruins when their schedule resumes on Saturday night at TD Garden against Anaheim.
McAvoy, who played an inspired brand of hockey for the Americans against Finland and Canada in games last week in Montreal, was boxing out midway through the third period of the romp over Finland when, during a puck scrum at the U.S. goalmouth, Armia crosschecked the defenseman from behind and straight toward the left post (the puck action was at the opposite post). McAvoy missed the post with his head but caught it hard between his neck and shoulder. Armia got a minor for roughing on the play. The score was 5-1 at the time.
He shook off the hit slowly, as his teammates confronted Armia. McAvoy returned to play a major role in the Americans’ victory against Canada, but that was not the end of his travail.
Here is the Bruins’ update:
Statement from Boston Bruins Head Team Physician Dr. Peter Asnis:
“Charlie McAvoy sustained an injury to his right shoulder acromioclavicular joint in Team USA’s 4 Nations Face-Off game against Finland on February 13. He underwent treatment, which was administered by Team USA’s medical staff. Upon returning to Boston, he developed increasing pain, for which he was evaluated by the Boston Bruins’ medical staff. After undergoing x-rays, MRIs, and bloodwork, he was diagnosed as having an infection in his right shoulder, as well as a significant injury to his AC joint. He underwent an irrigation and debridement procedure at Massachusetts General Hospital on February 18. He remains in the hospital, where he is being treated with IV antibiotics, and his condition is improving.”
Rink Rap: There is a lot going on with this, beginning with the apprehension NHL teams brought into the tournament where it concerns the health of their core players. Both Brady and Matthew Tkachuk have been injured in this tournament, but both are expected to be in uniform for the championship game Thursday night against the Canadians, who were without star defenseman Cale Makar when the team met in Montreal on Saturday. Qin Hughes, who is coming off an injury himself, is expected to make a bid at replacing McAvoy in the Team USA lineup.
Where it concerns the Bruins, well as Harry Sinden once told Rink Rap, “you never try to lose.”
If Hampus Lindholm can make it back into the Boston lineup for some of this must-win stretch facing the Bruins, then that might mitigate the loss of McAvoy for however long he needs to recover and return to hockey. In the meantime, no doubt the new dad’s family is relieved with the prognosis.
What will the Bruins do finally, as in what becometh their trade-deadline strategy so close to the playoff cutoff but, at the same time, stuck with a lousy hand of not enough games left and too many of those on the road where they’ve been putrid? That really depends on the availability of Hampus Lindholm and McAvoy going forward into this resumption of NHL hockey that begins on Saturday. The Bruins play three home games, then hit the road with the March 7 trade deadline fast approaching.
The Bruins traded Linus Ullmark on the day of Game 7 of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final, but I’m not expecting a trade tomorrow. Maybe today, maybe next week, maybe March 7. No doubt GM Don Sweeney’s cell is lighting up with calls on Trent Frederic, and there is probably a market for fellow impending free agent Justin Brazeau as well.
The one name that keeps popping up that doesn’t fit the same description is Morgan Geekie’s.
Geekie is a restricted free agent and has, at least relatively speaking, enjoyed a solid year (after a slow start). Once again, Geekie has proven resilient, versatile and hard working. He hasn’t knocked the season out of the park, but unless he is the painful sweetener that allows the Bruins to make a great trade at the deadline, it makes much more sense in this space to get him a mutually beneficial contract extension so he can continue to build his career in Boston.
When a team like the Bruins falls on hard times like they have this season, then the vultures circle in search of an easy score. Sweeney is nothing if not patient and persistent with his leverage in these matters.
Could Brandon Carlo go in a deal? (His name keeps popping up.) My answer to that is a rush of immediate questions: Who is going to play top-four right side for the Bruins if he does? What is now the basis of the Bruins’ foundation for success, is it no longer a “big three” defense core of McAvoy, Hampus Lindholm and Carlo?
Nikita Zadorov, a little like the great Al Iafrate, can play in a manner that begs us to put add name and call it a big four, but his overall body of work has been too far out of synch to make such a projection.
We know the foundation is no longer poured around two elite centerman named Patrice Bergeron and David Krejci, and Elias Lindholm has done too little this season to suggest the Bruins can continue identifying their strength down the middle as the core of their club.
Unless the rumors are true that the Canucks wish they had Zadorov back, the Bruins can only hope that getting this chaotic season behind Zadorov and Elias Lindholm will bring better and more consistent hockey out of them in 2025-26.
Lastly, Sweeney is working on something none of us have considered.
Rink Rap suspects that Bruins management wishes it had the luxury of a 2024-25 do-over without a Jeremy Swayman contract holdout, without three offseason surgeries delaying Brad Marchand’s midseason arrival to vintage if not prime-era form, and that Zadorov, Elias Lindhom and Matt Poitras could have entered the fray amidst more favorable atmospheric circumstances. How would it all have gone?
We will never know, and in this results business it doesn’t work that way unless you, like my eternally young colleague Chris Hurley, replay NHL seasons on Strat-O-Matic.
This has been one strange end to the Boston Bruins Centennial, and it’s not quite over yet. The fallout may only be about to happen in earnest.
The players, the puzzling slow start for so many that cannot be traced to the obvious circumstances facing Swayman and Marchand, to the coaching change, to a special-teams mystery theater, to the complete lack of staying power when stressed in games away from Boston. There are so many boxes the Bruins have checked that categorize them as outsiders this coming spring, and it’s a tough sell right now to imagine a rally on the other side of 4 Nations.
What NHL team governors decide about this exciting tournament versus the risk of injury to top players at such a critical juncture of the season is something to monitor.
After Canada tries to settle a score with the U.S. tomorrow night at TDG, the Bruins will drop the puck, play three home games and make some big decisions that will affect what the 2025-26 Bruins look like.
Lastly and I mean lastly, BetOnLine has sent out odds on first-minute fights and number of fights for the 4 Nations title match. I don’t bet, and the way last Saturday’s game unfolded was unpredictable, so this one is as well. Canada needs this. Hockey USA has become the dominant 18-20 national program in the world, and that’s as important to Canada as the Stanley Cup if not more so. First best-on-best in almost a decade, and the U.S. won that game, too. Canada needs the two points, and they need structured hockey to allow their superior strength down the middle of the rink to emerge. If there is an opening-minute fight, count me among the surprised.
Rink Rap with Mick Colageo 