After the second Team Canada practice ahead of the 4 Nations Face-Off, head coach Jon Cooper discussed selecting Jordan Binnington as the starter against Sweden, the Sidney Crosby-Nathan MacKinnon combination, Mark Stone’s fit on the Crosby-MacKinnon line, and the opportunity to watch McDavid on the best-on-best international stage.
How real is it starting to feel for you, and how much pressure do you feel with such high expectations for Team Canada?
Cooper: I think the group has been pretty focused on the task at hand, to be honest. Two days ago, we were playing an NHL game here, then there was the Super Bowl, and all of these guys are coming in. We are trying to overload these guys with information.
I don’t even know if there has been enough time to think about whether there is pressure or anything like that. What is pressure? It is something you put on yourself, right?
With the group we have, I am excited to be around the group to see what we can do. There are expectations of being a Canadian, wearing the flag, representing this country, how proud we are, and what we are doing. You can’t wear it as a burden. You just have to go out there, play the game you love, work your tails off, and see what happens.
There is a lot of pride in the room, but I don’t feel at all that these guys are feeling so much pressure. They are a confident group ready to go to work. They are sponging stuff in. It has been a fun group to be around.
How did the conversation go with Jordan Binnington when you let him know he had the net for the first game?
Cooper: He didn’t say, “Are you sure?” Naturally, he was really excited. He is a confident kid. He wants to be in that spot.
This decision wasn’t made months ago. A lot was going on with this decision. This kid has played in some big moments and in some big games. He is a competitor.
Not that the other guys aren’t, and these guys are ready to go if anything happens, but Jordan is going to be our guy. The kid has fire in the belly. He is a competitor. We’re really confident in him.
What is it like to coach Sidney Crosby? How would you compare the interaction you’ve had with him to other elite players that you have coached over your career?
Cooper: The interaction started when I was named head coach. Any time we played Pittsburgh, I met him after the game. There are text messages and phone calls. There are constant discussions. I am going to make an argument that I have talked to him more than our own captain.
Communication is a big part of this, developing relationships and finding out how these guys work. Sid is a big part of that.
Sid has seen things I haven’t seen on the international stage. He has been a part of these. As much as I think I see how things are going, it is great to have the perspective of someone who has been there and done that.
There has been a lot of communication between the two of us. I said in the press conference yesterday that there is no shock or surprise about why this kid has won as much as he has. There is no flaw in any way.
Talk about cool things to be a part of. This is a cool thing to be a part of because he is here.
What is the balance for you as the coach in terms of giving your original game plan a chance to find its sea legs, and yet every game feels like an elimination game off the hop? How do you think you are going to feel it out in the moment?
Cooper: It is hard to say until you are in the moment. A big part of coaching is preparation and planning. We have done that. The other part is to expect the unexpected.
When you are putting the puzzle together, it doesn’t mean all of the pieces are going to fit. Our job is to find what pieces are going to fit, and you have to find it in short order. We don’t have exhibition games. We don’t have the first 10 games of the regular season to see. This is it.
The other big thing is to not force things. Don’t be afraid to make a change, and we have talked to the players about this. Sometimes, you have to go on instincts. Every decision we make is not personal. The decisions made are about having a chance to win.
I think the guys really understand that we are doing our best, just as the [players] are. Hopefully, the chemistry is there with everybody, but if it is not, we have to make moves. The guys are well aware of that.
Victor Hedman was your captain just the other day. Today, he spoke and said he has a one-game winning streak against you. He played one game against you in the 2017 World Championships, and every time he goes into your office, he sees the silver medal and says, “I have the gold at home.” What are your thoughts about facing your captain as an opponent?
Cooper: Who did you say you were talking about? (laughs)
Victor was dumping that puck in, and it went through our goaltender’s legs somehow.
It is always hard playing against your guys. In the same tournament, we played against Vasilevskiy and Kucherov. I don’t like it. I don’t like playing against guys you’ve gone to war with. I cheer for these guys.
But he is not playing for us. You have to put the blinders on. We have to do everything we can to stop them and win this game. All you can hope for at the end of the game is that Victor Hedman was the best player on the ice for Sweden, and Canada won the game.
Success with the national team is a big part of Sidney Crosby’s legacy. There have been a lot of comparisons between Connor McDavid and Crosby over the years. How much do you think this combination is important at this stage in McDavid’s career? Why do you believe McDavid has what it takes to take the lead in this tournament?
Cooper: It has been extremely unfortunate for us that this is the first time Connor has been able to play in an international event. He has been in this league almost a decade, and we haven’t been able to see it.
Sid has been the benefactor of having Olympics and World Cups happen every however many years; plus, he has been in World Championships.
I don’t want to say this is Connor’s coming-out party, but it kind of is on the international stage. Hopefully, we are going to the Olympics in a year, and we get to see more and more of him.
It has been too bad that we haven’t been able to see him more often. For everybody in this tournament, there has been so much excitement, but for Connor, there might be a tad bit more. We all marvel at his talents. Doing it in the greatest league is one thing, but now it’s doing it with the best players against the best players.
I think he is really looking forward to this. It should be a treat for the fans. We haven’t been able to see this for a long, long time.
When you have Crosby and Nathan MacKinnon on the same line, what are you looking for in terms of which of the players lines up on the wing vs. center? After a few practices, how does it look?
Cooper: First of all, you are talking about chemistry, and anywhere those two have been in the last 24 hours, they have been together. They are constantly talking hockey with each other. They are constantly ribbing each other. It is actually quite a treat to listen to them go at it. It is really funny.
It is almost like there is a little brother and a big brother, and that is not just talking about the game of hockey. That is talking about the way they interact. I am a big believer in chemistry, and I am a big believer in the way guys think and the way they play. For me, it is just natural to put those guys together.
Is it going to work? We don’t know, but if you want to see two guys who really want it to work, it is those two guys.
The big thing is that they can both take draws on each side. It is a luxury to have multiple centers on lines, depending on what dot it is in.
Those guys train together in the summers. They do so many things together. They know each other. Hopefully, for us, it works out.
What makes Mark Stone a fit with Crosby and MacKinnon?
Cooper: If you look at Mark Stone, first of all, he is a hockey player. You know the term I am saying. He knows his game. He knows where to be.
He plays with Jack Eichel, and there are a lot of similarities in where Jack Eichel and where Nathan MacKinnon get pucks and want pucks, and what puts them in the best positon to succeed. Those are hard things to do.
People sit there and maybe say, “Stone is not the most fleet of foot,” but those guys who think the game fast play the game fast, and they can play with fast players. A guy with Stone’s hockey sense was an easy one to put with Mack.
Is the process of deciding on these lines, given all of the pieces available, a fun exercise, or is it difficult and headache-inducing because of all you have to choose from?
Cooper: Before the teams are being named, the bar napkins took a beating. That is the best part. That is how much fun it is.
When the team got picked, that is when you seriously took a deep dive. Communication with the players was a big thing for me. How we see them from the outside, how they see themselves when talking it through, and what they feel they need… Sometimes, you have a disagreement. “We don’t feel like you need this,” or, “He feels like he needs this.”
You think things through, and in the end, you come to a consensus of what is good for guys. That is without names on the back. It is just the type of player.
When we put the lines up a couple of days ago, it’s not like guys were like, “I can’t believe I am playing with him (in a bad way).” It was more, “I can’t believe I am playing with him (in a good way).” That is the excitement going on.
As a coach, can you take advantage of your two TV timeouts in the period, and are you looking forward to getting 30 more seconds with each TV timeout? Is it more of a burden?
Cooper: It will be long. TV timeouts are long as it is. Can you recharge some of your top-end players? Of course, you can, but what does it do to the guys who haven’t been out there, who haven’t been out before the TV timeout? Now, you have to wait through that. It is a double-edged sword in that part.
The unfortunate part about a TV timeout — and I don’t think people realize this — is that the arena isn’t silent. There is music and everything going on. It is a struggle for the players to hear anything you’re doing. The quick individual meetings can go on, but they are tough.
With the TV timeouts being another 30 seconds, we will just sit there, take a breath, recharge, refocus, and get the game plan together for what is going on. Especially knowing a minute or two before the TV timeout is coming, you can do some things you wouldn’t necessarily do because you know a big break is coming up.
A lot of those things go on in my head, but when the actual TV timeout is going on, it is difficult because of what is going on in the arena.
What would you say the identity of the Canadian team is?
Cooper: Gamers and winners. That is what we have.
