PITTSBURGH – The sight of Auston Matthews in pain on the bench briefly gave fans of the Toronto Maple Leafs reason for concern, but the 18-year-old emerged from Team North America’s final pre-tournament game pronouncing himself in good health.
Matthews had a hard shot go off his right foot during the first period of Wednesday’s 3-2 loss to the Czech Republic. He immediately left the ice, but remained in the game.
“It stings, but I don’t think it’s anything too serious,” he said afterwards. “It’s just one of those things – when you block a shot it’s going to sting. For all I know it’s fine.”
Matthews finished with more than 17 minutes of ice time and scored a power-play goal. He also got acquainted with future Maple Leafs teammate Roman Polak, who hammered Connor McDavid late in the second period before getting cross-checked to the ice by Matthews.
“Saying hi to Roman,” said Matthews. “He’s obviously a competitor, he competes hard. So we’ve just got to kind of keep our heads up out there.”
The loss was the first for Team North America, which registered 4-0 and 7-4 victories over Team Europe in its first two pre-tournament games.
They open the preliminary round of the World Cup against Finland on Sunday.
“As a team, I think this was a good wake-up call for us,” said Matthews. “Those first two games I think we might have had it a little too easy and I think today we were kind of forced to play more of a man’s game. I think it was a good challenge for us heading into the tournament.”
