MILAN \u2014 Dylan Larkin is almost embarrassed by the way his United States teammates talk about him.<\/p>\n
They talk about him with respect and adulation.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the greatest human beings I know,\u201d fellow University of Michigan alum Quinn Hughes said. \u201cA big mentor to me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the great people in this sport,\u201d Connor Hellebuyck said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe just brings energy all day long,\u201d J.T. Miller said. \u201cLoves hockey. He\u2019s a hockey nerd. He loves USA Hockey. His presence, it resonates in the whole room.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAn off-the-charts good person and hockey player,\u201d Jack Hughes said.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomebody you root for,\u201d Jack Eichel said. \u201cSomebody who deserves to win, to be on a winner more than anybody I know.\u201d<\/p>\n
Larkin, 29, may be the best player in the NHL who has won basically nothing.<\/p>\n
He has won one playoff game, and that was during his rookie year a decade ago. He bleeds USA Hockey, yet his only gold medal was 12 years ago at the Under-18 Worlds.<\/p>\n
Yet, everything about the Detroit Red Wings captain and his complete game screams winner.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s why so many of his teammates are so tickled that Larkin is playing such a huge part in this undefeated Olympic run so far for the United States. As Quinn Hughes said late Friday night, \u201cWe\u2019ve been talking about having a fast start, and leave it to Larks to get us going \u2026 again.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a 6-2 rout over Slovakia to catapult the Americans into a gold-medal showdown with rival Canada on Sunday afternoon, it was Larkin scoring the first goal for the second time in two games.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m just trying to chip in and, I think, prove myself playing in big games that I can do it,\u201d Larkin said. \u201cIt means a lot to me because I haven\u2019t had a lot of opportunities to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n
This is Larkin\u2019s first chance to win something on such a big stage, and just like last year\u2019s 4 Nations Face-Off, he\u2019s proving to be a big-game player who\u2019s willing to do anything for his team.<\/p>\n
Faceoffs? He has won a tournament-best 76.3 percent. Penalty kill? He\u2019s part of 15 for 15 PK. Power play? He\u2019s willing to start on the No. 2 unit even though he was moved up to the first unit when Tage Thompson missed the third period Friday with a lower-body injury.<\/p>\n
Defensively, offensively, special teams, the coaches trust putting Larkin out in any situation. He has scored two goals and an assist in five games and got chills Friday night thinking about the chance to win gold against Canada.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt just feels right,\u201d Larkin said. \u201cIt\u2019s the matchup everyone wanted. It\u2019s going to be a battle of the ages, I think.\u2019\u2019<\/p>\n
Larkin is part of a star-studded summer skate that starts in July in Plymouth, Michigan. It includes the Hughes brothers, Zach Werenski, Kyle Connor, Hellebuyck, Cole Caufield, Alex DeBrincat, Trevor Zegras, Josh Norris, Jake Sanderson and so many others. It\u2019s so good, so high-tempo, so competitive that players from all over the league, including Macklin Celebrini, pop in to join periodically. Jim Hughes, father of Quinn, Jack and Luke, runs the skates.<\/p>\n
Larkin is one of the leaders of the crew and helped get it started.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know it\u2019s a summer skate, but if people came and watched how intense they are and how competitive they are, they\u2019d be shocked,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cWe compete like we\u2019re playing Game 7; we want to win. When we do battle drills, our team wants to win the day more than that team. It\u2019s just like we go at it with each other.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s there where Larkin really shows off his incredible speed, competitiveness and drive to win.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a reason he was named captain of an Original Six team at such a young age,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cHe\u2019s made for big moments like this. Unfortunately, he hasn\u2019t had enough of them in his career. I feel like when he gets into the playoffs, you\u2019re going to hear about him a lot more and see more things like this. But you look at the 4 Nations last year against Canada, a huge goal for us. (Against Sweden), a huge goal for us to get us going. I think the way he leads our group, he\u2019s vocal, he leads us on the ice for warmups. And he\u2019s just got so much energy coming out of the room, it\u2019s incredible. I think it gets guys right into the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
The one thing about the United States\u2019 centers \u2014 Auston Matthews, Eichel, Brock Nelson and especially Larkin \u2014 is that none cheat the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I just love the way (Larkin) plays,\u201d Werenski said. \u201cI love the way he competes in all three zones.\u201d<\/p>\n
When you come to a tournament like the Olympics and play on a team as talented and deep as the United States, you have to be selfless. Larkin epitomizes that.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s a guy who is one of the better offensive players in the league, and isn\u2019t playing top power play here, and is just so happy to do whatever it takes to win, and it\u2019s great to see him get rewarded, because he\u2019s been playing so well for us,\u201d Matthew Tkachuk said. \u201cHe\u2019s been a very integral part of our team this year and last year, and it\u2019s been very, very important for us. And he\u2019s a hell of a leader, and guys love playing with him, and definitely listen when he speaks.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe always shows up in big moments,\u201d brother Brady Tkachuk said. \u201cHe\u2019s always the X-factor.\u201d<\/p>\n
Even coach Mike Sullivan says, \u201cWe root for all the guys, but Larks in particular, he\u2019s gone through the experience that he\u2019s gone through in Detroit. I think that team is becoming formidable at this point. I think they\u2019re emerging right now, and he\u2019s a big part of it. He\u2019s a big part of this team. He\u2019s a fierce competitor. He\u2019s a terrific player on both sides of the puck. You can utilize him in so many ways. The thing that probably I\u2019ve really grown to admire about him is getting to know him as a person, which you don\u2019t get to do when you play against him in the NHL all the time.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe 4 Nations experience and now the Olympics has given me an opportunity to get to know him a little bit as a person, and then you realize the intangibles that he brings to the table and why he is the player that he is. He\u2019s a great teammate. All he wants to do is win. He\u2019s willing to embrace anything we ask of him to do so, and he\u2019s capable in so many ways. Am I rooting for him? Absolutely.\u201d<\/p>\n
Larkin is humbled by the way people talk about him.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know why,\u201d he said. \u201cWe got a group in there that\u2019s pretty special and look after each other and like to have fun. But when it gets down to the battle, we\u2019re all in it together, and that\u2019s the beauty of it.\u201d<\/p>\n
Larkin is soaking in every moment of this Olympic experience, from sightseeing in Milan to life in the Olympic Village to meeting celebrities such as Snoop Dogg.<\/p>\n
\u201cProbably one of the few people I\u2019ve met that\u2019s kind of larger than life, \u201d Larkin said. \u201c \u2026 Getting to meet him, I\u2019ll probably remember forever.\u201d<\/p>\n
But Larkin and the U.S. are reaching the finish line, and Larkin wants nothing more than to go out with the biggest win of his career.<\/p>\n
The most special win of his career.<\/p>\n
\u201cUSA Hockey means the world to me, and I\u2019m here because of USA Hockey,\u201d Larkin said. \u201cIt\u2019s (one game) for legacy. Sully\u2019s talked about the number of guys that have won an Olympic gold medal in the U.S., and it\u2019s a small number, and we\u2019d like to be a part of that and inspire kids for generations to come.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"MILAN \u2014 Dylan Larkin is almost embarrassed by the way his United States teammates talk about him. They…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":465230,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5101],"tags":[599,93,5137,5,54125,4,2602,3358,5138],"class_list":{"0":"post-465229","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-detroit-red-wings","8":"tag-detroit","9":"tag-detroit-red-wings","10":"tag-detroitredwings","11":"tag-hockey","12":"tag-mens-olympic-ice-hockey","13":"tag-nhl","14":"tag-olympics","15":"tag-red-wings","16":"tag-redwings"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/116106182452497877","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465229","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=465229"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/465229\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/465230"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=465229"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=465229"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=465229"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}