Canada entered the 2026 Olympics men’s ice hockey tournament as the odds-on favorites for the gold medal.
After one game, the team did little to dissuade that notion.
The team full of NHL superstars took until the final seconds of the first period to score its first goal, but added four thereafter to cruise to a 5-0 win over Czechia in Group A action.
Here are the top lessons learned from the opener, along with the player of the game, an overall team grade and a key question to ponder before Friday’s contest against Switzerland.
Takeaway 1: The kid’s alright
Welcome to the Olympics, Macklin Celebrini. The 19-year-old San Jose Sharks phenom — he has 81 points in 55 games, 42 points more than his closest teammate — played his way onto Team Canada but also had earned praise from players like captain Sidney Crosby, who played with him at the 2025 IIHF world championships. In his Olympic debut, he scored one of the game’s most critical goals to give Canada a lead after the first period.
The play started with Mark Stone trying to find Connor McDavid behind the Czech defensemen who were trailing him. McDavid’s speed caused goalie Lukas Dostal — who was frequently brilliant in this game — to dump the puck the boards with the seconds ticking away. McDavid recovered the puck and sent a backhand pass to the high slot where it was collected by defenseman Cale Makar.
The Czechs gave Celebrini about a square mile to himself in front of the net, giving Makar an easy target for a pass that the Sharks star tipped home, his stick barely under the crossbar’s height. Celebrini’s goal was scored with 5.7 seconds left in the first period.
Would a scoreless first period have changed the trajectory of the game? Probably not, given the scoring depth Canada would eventually flex and the limited offensive threats of the Czechs. But it was a punch to the gut from Canada after what could have been a confidence-building first 20 minutes that included a key penalty kill and a Nathan MacKinnon goal that was negated by a Nick Suzuki tripping penalty.
MACKLIN CELEBRINI GOAL. CALE MAKAR ASSIST.
Team Canada grabs their first goal of the Winter Olympics! pic.twitter.com/Y9g95czCNp
— NBC Olympics & Paralympics (@NBCOlympics) February 12, 2026
Takeaway 2: Battlers of Florida
The Olympics are the place where bitter NHL rivals pause their animosity to represent their homelands. Coach Jon Cooper gave us a brief reminder of that when he sent out a line that featured his Tampa Bay Lightning star Brandon Hagel skating with Florida Panthers agitators Sam Bennett and Brad Marchand. Could these Battle of Florida teammates co-exist? Ultimately it didn’t matter, as Cooper eventually created an all-Panthers line with Bennett, Marchand and forward Sam Reinhart.
That group didn’t see a ton of ice time in Canada’s opening win, but Marchand had a difference-making play on Bo Horvat‘s game-clinching second-period goal: a gorgeous pass to find Horvat at full speed to make it 3-0. That Marchand made the play in front of the penalty box was sort of poetic, too.
Takeaway 3: That power play
In the third period, leading 3-0, Canada went on a power play. MacKinnon won the faceoff. McDavid settled the puck and passed to Makar, who gave it back to McDavid, who passed to Crosby, who switched places with McDavid and gave the puck back to him, who then sent a pass across the crease to MacKinnon to make it 4-0.
All of this took 12 seconds.
Canada’s power play isn’t unstoppable. It went 1-for-3 against the Czechs, after all. But when it works, it’s like watching one of the greatest assemblages of talent the Olympic tournament has ever seen. The kind of power play that feels like there should be international sanctions to ban it.
The best advice to anyone hoping to take this team down in the medal round — cough, Team USA, cough — is to just stay out of the penalty box.
The task for Binnington in Canada’s Olympic opener was not to fumble the bag. He was given the start just under a year after leading Canada to gold in the 4 Nations Face-Off. Everyone remembers his unbelievable play in the overtime against Team USA, securing the championship for Canada. Less remembered was his play before that game, where there were conversations about whether Binnington should even be the guy that plays in that game.
While it’s still not in the same conversation with Team USA’s trio of netminders — Connor Hellebuyck, Jake Oettinger and Jeremy Swayman — Canada’s goaltending is improved. They swapped Adin Hill and Sam Montembeault for Darcy Kuemper and Logan Thompson, two solid goaltenders that might have Binnington looking over his shoulder.
So a good start against the Czechs goes a long way for Binnington, especially in light of his atrocious regular-season stats for the St. Louis Blues (minus-24.9 goals saved above expected, via Money Puck).
He wasn’t perfect, with some wonky rebounds. He won’t need to be, given the team in front of him. But he did enough not to crack the door open for Kuemper or Thompson, making 26 saves in the shutout win.
Big question for the next game: Has Jon Cooper found his lines?
All four of Team Canada’s lines scored goals against the Czechs:
Macklin Celebrini-Connor McDavid-Tom Wilson
Brandon Hagel-Nathan MacKinnon-Nick Suzuki
Mitch Marner-Sidney Crosby-Mark Stone
Brad Marchand-Bo Horvat-Sam Reinhart
(Sam Bennett was the 13th forward in the game.)
There’s probably no reason for Cooper and his staff to mess up a good thing after this total domination by Canada. But group play is a time to tinker. Will Cooper get a look at some new combinations against the Swiss, who looked expectedly good against France in their opener? Or is this Team Canada moving forward (and barring injury)?
One other question for the Canadians, which will impact their lineup: What’s the status of defenseman Josh Morrissey? The Winnipeg Jets blueliner played a game-low 7 minutes and 10 seconds for Canada, leaving their bench in the second period for treatment of an undisclosed injury. Cooper said that Morrissey attempted to return but couldn’t.
Vegas Golden Knights defenseman Shea Theodore, who had been Canada’s seventh defenseman in the game, stepped up to play 15:25.
There was no word on the status of Morrissey for Canada’s next game against the Swiss on Friday. Once a team plays its first game in the Olympic tournament, they can’t add anyone else to the roster. The only defenseman who didn’t suit up for Canada against the Czechs was Travis Sanheim of the Philadelphia Flyers, who can play the left side like Morrissey does, but doesn’t bring anything close to Morrissey’s puck-moving offensive game.
Hopefully Morrissey is good to go for the rest of the tournament. Please recall that he missed the 4 Nations Face-Off championship game, where Canada won in overtime, because of illness.
Overall team grade: A
Not much to quibble about in this one. Maybe the slow start? Team Canada looked good in every facet of its win over the Czechs. The team rolled four lines. The power play cooked when it needed to cook. Binnington handled the chances the Czechs could generate, which weren’t many.
On paper, it might not have seemed like it would be this easy with Dostal in net and a few quality scorers (David Pastrnak, Tomas Hertl, Martin Necas) peppering the Czech lineup. But it was, and Canada planted its flag as this tournament’s favorite after the opener.
