Brady Tkachuk's excitement about getting the chance to play for the United States and team up with his brother, Florida Panthers forward Matthew Tkachuk, at the 4 Nations Face-Off next month was obvious as he spoke on this week's episode of the "NHL @TheRink" podcast presented by SKIP.
Tkachuk, the Ottawa Senators captain, talked with co-hosts Dan Rosen and Shawn P. Roarke about what the tournament means to him and why the opportunity to play with Matthew is so special.
It will be the first time the Tkachuk brothers will be teammates other than at the 2023 NHL All-Star Game.
Brady is, of course, hoping to get the chance to play on the same line as his brother.
"It'll be a lot of fun," Tkachuk said. "I'll feel bad for our centerman at times, but I think we would have of course a lot of chemistry."
Tkachuk also talked about the attention he and his brother, and their family, get in the hockey community and why that means so much to him.
The interview with Tkachuk runs for about 15 minutes in the middle of the episode.
Rosen and Roarke open the show discussing their reactions to the blockbuster trade Friday involving the Colorado Avalanche, Carolina Hurricanes and Chicago Blackhawks that saw Mikko Rantanen and Taylor Hall go to Carolina and Martin Necas and Jack Drury to Colorado.
The co-hosts then go into a conversation about the Vancouver Canucks and if it was right for president Jim Rutherford to go public with the rift between forwards Elias Pettersson and J.T. Miller as he did in a story in The Globe and Mail on Tuesday.
The co-hosts also gave their opinions on who could replace Alex Pietrangelo with Team Canada for the 4 Nations Face-Off, with Roarke offering details on why he thinks Bowen Byram of the Buffalo Sabres would be the right choice, and Rosen stumping for MacKenzie Weegar of the Calgary Flames.
They touched on Logan Thompson's new contract with the Washington Capitals, the Minnesota Wild getting used to life without Kirill Kaprizov , and the NHL Quarter-Century teams.
The "NHL @TheRink" podcast presented by SKIP is free and listeners can subscribe on all podcast platforms. It is also available on NHL.com/multimedia/podcasts and the NHL app.