Victor Hedman has been a big part of Sweden’s teams in previous international competitions. But for the Tampa Bay Lightning defenseman, being named captain for Team Sweden for the 4 Nations Face-Off is quite a special honor.
“That’s obviously surreal,” the 34-year-old said on Thursday. “Think last time I wore the ‘C’ for the Three Crowns was Under 18 (when Sweden won bronze at the IIHF World U18 Championships) so to get the opportunity to do it at this level, obviously a different format but the first best-on-best that we’ve had since 2016 (World Cup of Hockey), it’s going to be a tremendous honor.
“Every time you get to wear any sort of letter for a team [it’s great] but for your nation to get to wear the ‘C’ it’s a dream come true. I’m super excited and hopefully it’s not the last time I get to do it.”
This is the first time Hedman will captain Sweden in international play since he joined the NHL. He was an assistant captain for Sweden at the 2024 IIHF World Championships, where they won bronze.
Hedman is in his first season as Lightning captain.
The 4 Nations Face-Off is an international tournament featuring teams made up of only NHL players from Canada, Finland, Sweden and the United States.
The teams will play each other once in a round-robin format starting on Feb. 12 at Bell Centre in Montreal. The final day of the round robin is Feb. 17 at TD Garden in Boston, with the two top teams advancing to the championship game on Feb. 20 in Boston.
Team Sweden will hold its first practice in Montreal on Feb. 10, one day after the Lightning play the Montreal Canadiens at Bell Centre.