Leading Team USA to the gold

Long Beach’s Charlie McAvoy shines in world junior hockey championships

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“I’ll be on Cloud 9 if anyone needs me — World Champions #USA,” Long Beach native Charlie McAvoy tweeted after the United States defeated Canada, 5-4, on Jan. 5 to win the world junior hockey title.

The U.S. took home the gold in the 2017 International Ice Hockey Federation’s World Junior Championship in Montreal, and McAvoy was named the U.S. Player of the Game.

“It was probably the most exciting game I’ve ever been a part of, and it was just a great experience,” McAvoy, a 19-year-old defenseman who also plays for Boston University, told the Herald. “It’s hard to believe when everything is stacked against you and all those Canadians are screaming against you.”

The IIHF World Junior Championships is an annual event for national under-20 teams from around the world, and the main tournament features the 10 top-ranked nations. Last week marked Team USA’s fourth gold medal win since 2004.

“He’s competing with the best 20-and-under hockey players in the world,” Joe Brand, coach of Long Beach High School’s hockey team and a friend of the McAvoy family, said of Charlie. “You look at who’s played for this team and it’s Hall of Famers, a who’s who in the NHL now. He’s a great kid who deserves everything coming his way, because he’s done nothing but work hard and sacrifice to get where he is.”

Topping 2016 won’t be easy for McAvoy, who was selected by the Boston Bruins in the first round of the NHL Draft after a solid freshman season at B.U. He led all Terrier defenseman with 25 points, notching three goals and 22 assists in 37 games.

The 6-foot-1, 200-pound blue-liner played alongside fellow Bruins prospect Matt Grzelcyk at B.U., and was named to the Hockey East All-Rookie Team despite being the youngest player in NCAA Division I hockey.

Before starting college, McAvoy spent two seasons with USA Hockey’s National Team Development Program and competed in the 2016 World Junior Ice Hockey Championships on a squad that earned a bronze medal, which he said gave him an edge this year.

“It helped me by having that experience, and I’ve seen a lot happen in this tournament,” he said.

In last week’s championship game, Canada seemed poised to win after taking a 2-0 lead over the U.S. in the first 20 minutes. But the game took a turn in the second period, when McAvoy scored the first goal and the American team gained some momentum.

McAvoy helped it rally twice from two-goal deficits, and the squad won the gold medal in a shootout. McAvoy had an assist as well as a goal, and led the team in ice time.

Goaltender Tyler Parsons made 46 saves for Team USA, and stopped all five Canadian attempts in the shootout. Troy Terry had the lone shootout goal for the Americans.

McAvoy opened the scoring for the U.S. at the 3:04 mark of the second period, and assisted on B.U. teammate Kieffer Bellows’s goal in the third period to cut Canada’s lead to 4-3.

The mostly Canadian crowd showed no love for Team USA — McAvoy said that the Americans were booed throughout, which made winning that much sweeter.

“We knew that being in Montreal, it was going to be a crazy crowd,” he said. “Aside from a few family members, it was basically 200,000 Canadians kind of hating us for the whole game there. It was kind of like an added motivation when you’re trying to not only beat the guys across the aisle but going against the whole crowd. There’s that much more on the line.”

The win capped a stunning tournament run for the U.S., which won twice over the host nation and defeated Russia 4-3 in a dramatic semifinal matchup. McAvoy said that a near loss to Switzerland in the quarterfinals strengthened the team’s resolve.

“It’s been incredible to see how many people have been reaching out to me and to my dad from Long Beach and from all over, congratulating us,” he said. “It’s cool to see the kind of hype that this tournament gets, and the publicity it gets is pretty special, and to be a part of it was really cool.”

The gold medal win sparked some hometown pride among Long Beach residents.

“You couldn’t be happier for the kid, and he deserves all the success, and it’s great for Long Beach,” said Terence Mulligan, a coach of the Long Beach Lightning hockey team. “It’s great for the kids in this town because now they have a local hero to look up to.”

“We were up there to witness it, so it was really special,” said McAvoy’s father, Charlie Sr., who runs McAvoy Plumbing on West Park Avenue. “It was a great tournament and the team played awesome. To go 7 and 0 and beat Russia twice and Canada twice in the same tournament was — there’s almost no words for it. It’s really special for USA hockey.”

McAvoy, a communications major at B.U., is already looking ahead, but said that at the moment he’s concentrating on school.

“We’re going to make our run in the regular season, and hopefully that will include us ending in April at the national championships,” he said. “I’ll have my hands full here at school, and once the season is over there will be a conversation to be had with the Bruins and a few people closest to me, and we’ll figure out what my next step is going to be.”

Ben Strack and Bridget Downes contributed to this story.