Jack Hughes secured his place at the 2026 Winter Olympics. Despite a down season that includes two different injuries and his worst output on a per-game basis since 2020-21. He’s still averaging a point per game, but he’s only played 36 games this season. 

He is somewhat healthy in time of the Olympics. His hand is not fully healed yet, but whatever caused him to miss the last few games with the Devils is no longer an issue. 

Despite his health, Jack Hughes is not getting the “Jack Hughes treatment” from head coach Mike Sullivan. Right now, he’s on the fourth line with J.T. Miller and Brock Nelson. That’s not what Hughes wants going into this tournament. 

He won’t have a ton of time with lines stacked to the gills, like the top line of the Tkachuk brothers and Jack Eichel and the second line of Jake Guentzel, Matthew Boldy, and Auston Matthews. The only chance Hughes has to move up is to go crazy in group play. There’s a chance that it can happen, since they have Germany, Denmark, and Latvia in their group. These aren’t exactly a murderer’s row before they head to the knockout round. 

Hughes will have a chance to showcase something, but with such an emphasis on goal differential, Sullivan will want to pad the score in each game. So, maybe he won’t get the chance that we’re hoping for.

Where things get odd with Hughes is the power play. In fact, the New Jersey Devils star isn’t even on the power play. 

USA power-play units as I saw the players

PP1: Auston, Eichel, Quinn, Matthew Tkachuk, Tage

PP2: Brady, Boldy, Connor, Werenski, Guentzel

👊

— Michael Russo (@RussoHockey) February 11, 2026Jack Hughes isn’t getting much time to impress on Team USA

Leaving Jack Hughes off the power play is really setting him up to fail at the Olympics. At the 4 Nations Face-Off, Hughes only had one point in three games. He didn’t exactly impress, but it wasn’t like he was an issue, either. It was a short tournament with the top four teams in the world. 

With Hughes playing fewer minutes and the power play going without him, we can’t expect much from him at this tournament. What can he do to move up in the lineup? The easiest route to it is wildly outplaying Matthew Boldy. That’s the most obvious place for Hughes, as that’s where he played at the 4 Nations (next to Matthews). 

We’re just not seeing a good situation to get the best out of Jack Hughes. He likes to play with space, and we can’t see him getting much when he’s not on either unit of the PP. He likes to play with speed, but he’s alongside Nelson and Miller. 

We would like to bring up that it is the New York Rangers head coach making these decisions. Obviously, Hughes has had his issues this season, and he hasn’t looked like himself with the cast on his hand, but he deserves better than this.