WHITEFISH, Mt. – As Canadians and Americans were chucking knuckles for their countries in the highly popular and politicized 4 Nations Face-Off, a hockey team from Canmore had its own Maple Leaf versus Bald Eagle moment.
And, American readers, crumple up the paper or turn off your smartphone because another L is coming your way.
With the Smash n’ Bash Tournament trophy on the line, the Canmore Flyers Hockey Club put the puck on the stick of Jeremy Reich as the last skater in the shootout.
Playing in the tournament finals against the hometown club from Whitefish, Montana, earlier this month, the local men’s rec team described as a “high-end beer league” team, laced ‘em up and found a spike of youthful energy … mostly.
“I just happened to be the last shooter and I basically wanted to end it because we were more tired than anything, I think,” said Reich with a laugh.
The Flyers are made up of mostly former pros and junior players such as ex-NHLers Reich and Kevin Smyth, Colby Genoway who played in the American Hockey League and Kontinental Hockey League, and junior A competitors such as hometown boys Jeremy Gordon, Jonas Gordon and Simon Philp, among others.
Going undefeated in the three-day tournament, the Canmore crew set up a Canadian versus US showdown on Feb. 9 – a few days before the start of the NHL’s mini international tournament, 4 Nations.
Up against the young, fast and talented team south of the border, the Flyers “really wanted” to beat Whitefish.
“We watched a few of their games previously and they were skating pretty well and were hard on pucks so we knew it was going to be a tough game,” said Philp.
Philp, owner of the Sports Garage in town and fresh off a Connor McDavid-esque six-point performance the game before, opened up the scoring five minutes into the finals. Canmore took a 2-0 lead at the end of the first, but Whitefish fought back to tie things at two in the second.
The Flyers, now starting to feel their age, gained the advantage again, going up by one. However, the persistent Whitefish weren’t filleted yet. With six minutes left, the hometown club made the crowd get off their butts and cheer as Whitefish lit up the lamp.
“We were pretty gassed by that point because we only had 10 guys and they had three full lines – they had an extra line than we did – and then super tight checking in the last six, seven minutes,” said Philp. “Nobody could score and then we ended up going to a shootout.”
With no goals in back-to-back three-minute overtimes, the game came down to players vs. goalies, with the teams’ best three gunslingers going for glory.
Flyers goalie Jon Olthius, a former ECHL netminder, made three critical stops against Whitefish's shootout attempts. After two misses from the Flyers, the puck came to the team’s third skater in the shootout: Reich.
Skating toward the Whitefish’s netminder Kelly Murphy, Reich, the owner of Canmore Sweatshop, did the same move he’s done throughout his entire career in that situation – a deke and backhand – which smacked the puck in the back of the net.
It was “a good feeling” for the Flyers to see it go in.
“It was definitely nice to beat an American team in the States when all of this is going on, but it was still rec league game, but it was pretty intense for some half washed up guys out there,” said Reich with a laugh.
Celebrating cup victory with their names ingrained on it are Reich, Philp, Olthius, Smyth, the Gordons, Genoway, Rob Anderson, Bobby Richardson, Beau Evans, and Kurtis Dulle.
Despite a wound-up political landscape between the United States government and Canada right now, Anderson said the Whitefish faithful “welcomed us with open arms.”
Of the 10 teams in the tournament, only the hometown club was from the United States – the rest were teams from Alberta and British Columbia.
It’s uncertain if the Flyers will return in 2026 to defend the trophy.
“We said we’re not going back but can almost guarantee we will be,” said Reich.
4 Nations Face-Off by the numbers
If you haven’t seen Connor McDavid’s McGolden Goal yet, stop everything and watch.
Last Thursday’s (Feb. 20) 4 Nations Face-Off finals when Canada defeated the United States 3-2 in overtime drew massive viewing numbers of 16.1 million viewers in North America, with 6.3 in Canada and 9.3 million in the US.
According to the NHL, it was the second most watched hockey game of the past decade – Game 7 between the Florida Panthers and Edmonton Oilers in the 2024 Stanley Cup Finals drew an audience of 16.3 million – and the most watched non-NFL game ever on ESPN+.
The game reached one of every four Canadians on Sportsnet platforms.
The 4 Nations Face-Off was a best-on-best international mini-tournament played between Canada, USA, Sweden and Finland.
