With the Olympic Winter Games set to start out in a few days, there has finally been an announcement on who the captain of the U.S. Men’s Ice Hockey Team can be, based on Chris Johnston of The Athletic.
“Auston Matthews has been named captain of Team USA on the Milan Olympics, with Charlie McAvoy and Matthew Tkachuk serving as alternate captains,” Johnston wrote on X, formerly Twitter.
General manager Bill Guerin made a press release in regards to the announcement of the captains.
“Auston, Charlie and Matthew did an amazing job in leading our team a 12 months ago on the 4 Nations Face-Off and it’s great to have them back in those roles for the Olympics,” Guerin said. “All of them bring different leadership traits to the table and I do know all three are excited, as is our whole team, about representing our country as a part of Team USA.”
Matthews was an element of the gold medal-winning U.S. Under-18 Men’s National Team on the 2014 IIHF Under-18 Men’s World Championship.
As for Matthews, McAvoy, and Tkachuk, they’ve played together thrice on the international level. They recently helped the U.S. place second within the 4 Nations Face-Off last February in Montreal and Boston. They helped the U.S. earn gold on the 2015 IIHF Under-18 Men’s World Championship and bronze on the 2016 IIHF World Junior Championship.
Matthews is currently the captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs, so that is nothing recent to him to be a pacesetter amongst men.
Team USA will open play on Feb. 12 in Milan against Latvia.