Best-on-best hockey is back. The 4Nations Face-Off tournament is underway, with Team Canada’s first game being against William Nylander and Team Sweden.

Early on, Team Canada was on fire. With speed, physicality, and an aura around them that felt unstoppable, they looked amazing. They had a few chances early, and before you knew it Team Canada ended up on the powerplay from a William Nylander high stick.

Within the first 15 seconds of the powerplay, Sidney Crosby had the puck on the goal line, and fed Nathan MacKinnon with a beautiful cross crease, behind the back pass for a wide open cage. Captain Canada wasted no time showing off in this tournament, helping give Canada a 1-0 lead early.

Team Canada was all over Sweden in the opening frame, giving them little to no offense throughout the entire period. With 6:45 left in the period, Seth Jarvis fed the puck up to Lightning forward Brayden Point, who found Brad Marchand with a cross slot pass for another wide open cage, doubling Canada’s lead. The Bell Centre erupted as Marchand put the puck in the back of the net, one of the only times that Montreal would cheer for the Bruins captain. Canada ended the period with a 2-0 lead and outshooting Sweden 7-3.

The second period proved to be a little bit of a bounce-back effort from Sweden. With a more aggressive approach, they finally started to get more pucks on net. Early on in the period, defender Shea Theodore took a hit along the boards from Adrian Kempe and looked to have injured his wrist during the play. Theodore wouldn’t return for the rest of the contest.

Sweden finally got on the board at 10:27 with a shot from Wild defender Jonas Brodin, that was just outside of the right circle that beat Jordan Binnington over his left shoulder.

With 2:32 left, Canada regained the two-goal lead with another great pass from Sidney Crosby, this time to Vegas captain Mark Stone who was in the perfect position to recieve the pass and score past the Sweden goaltender with a nice snap shot.

Headed into the third period and up 3-1, Canada looked to hold on and grab the first win of the tournament. Less than two minutes into the period, Sweden scored to make it a one goal game, with a snap shot from Adrian Kempe that Jordan Binnington should have saved. Nonetheless, Canada still had work to do to hold on to the lead.

With 11 minutes to go in the game, Sweden was able to equalize the contest with a snap shot past a fallen Binnington. Team Canada lost the 3-1 lead, and needed to tilt the ice in their favour quickly. Jets defender Josh Morrissey took a high sticking penalty with about 7 minutes to go, and Canada effectively killed that penalty, with a shorthanded chance as well. No team could gain the lead in the final minutes, and with that the first game of the 4Nations tournament was headed to overtime.

With a 10-minute, 3-on-3 overtime getting underway, the atmosphere was absolutely electric. Sweden controlled the play for the first minute of the extra frame, with a couple chances at a win. Canada fought back with some chances of their own, and as teams went back and forth, time dwindled down. Sweden had a great chance from a one-timer by Mika Zibanejad, and Jordan Binnington robbed Team Sweden of the win.

With less than four minutes remaining in overtime, Canada gained possession, with Sidney Crosby skating the puck up the neutral zone and crossing over the line. With no pass option, Crosby passed it straight back into the neutral zone for Mitch Marner to retrieve. Marner gains the zone and backs down Erik Karlsson, breaking off to the right side and scoring on a beautiful wrist shot to give Team Canada the overtime win.

The postgame celebrations were loud, as the Bell Centre did not stop cheering for Crosby until he was announced as the player of the game. Canada takes the win in the first game of the 4Nations tournament, and will get ready for their game against Team USA on Saturday.