Matthews’ massive night couldn’t have come at a better time for the United States

Team USA wrapped up a perfect run through its group stage schedule at the 2026 Winter Olympics in the men’s hockey tournament with a 5-1 win over Team Germany on Sunday.

After previously defeating Team Latvia and Team Denmark, the Americans took care of business, winning a group in which they were massive favorites and clinching a bye into the quarterfinals in the process.

Though it was a strong showing for the entire team, there’s little question that the player of the game for Team USA was Auston Matthews, who scored two goals and recorded an assist in the winning effort.

Matthews has often been maligned for his lack of production in big moments; he notably did not score a goal at last year’s 4 Nations Face-Off event, but through three games in this tournament, he’s looked increasingly like the lethal offensive force he’s consistently proven to be throughout his NHL career.

On Saturday’s Daily Faceoff post-game show, Jonny Lazarus and E.J. Hradek discussed why Matthews finding his game bodes well for the Americans as the tournament shifts to win-or-go-home mode.

Jonny Lazarus: “I think the game he had today, too, at the moment that he had it, the third game in the preliminary round. Now, they’re gonna go to the quarterfinals to have like a deep breath, right, because we need him to be our best player. So I don’t want to put all the focus on Matthews, but the timing of this game couldn’t have felt more perfect for number 34.”

E.J. Hradek: “Well, you need him to score goals, right? Whether he’s the best player, we could go through all kinds of discussion about all the good players on this team, right? He needs a goal scorer and he needs to score goals. And if you go back 4 Nations last year Johnny, right? He had moments in overtime and in the parts of those games, It almost seems like he’s snakebitten in some ways because he gets these great chances and then Binnington stops him, or he hits the post, and I’ve seen that happen in different games in different parts of his career.

“It’s hard to explain, but the bottom line is he is a goal scorer. He’s a darn good one, and one of the very, very best since he came into the league, if not the best, and so he needs to score goals. Got a couple today, and hopefully that carries forward for him.”

You can watch the full segment and the rest of the postgame show here…